A Lesson in Drowning
by theherocomplex
Summary: With Danarius dead, and Meredith outwardly civil, Hawke dares to hope that quieter days lie ahead for herself and Fenris. That hope was only her first mistake.
1. Chapter 1

It is well past midnight and the wicks have nearly dropped into the wax when someone knocks on Orsino's door.

"First Enchanter?" His visitor is barely audible over the rain pattering against his windows. "Are you there?"

Orsino looks up from his book, frowning. He often lingers in his study, hours after the rest of the tower goes to sleep, but no one ever visits him so late save templars, and they don't bother to knock. He rises slowly, ignoring the sour voice in the back of his head whispering, _what's Meredith done now?_ , and stops with his hand on the latch.

"Who is it?" he asks. "It's late, and you should be in bed." A mage caught out of their chambers will be hauled in for questioning, and he doesn't wish that on any of his charges.

The person on the other side of the door laughs miserably. "Let me in," they plead. Orsino's frown deepens. He knows that voice, but he can't place it, not through the door, and not muffled by the rain outside. "I need your help, Orsino. It won't take long, but — please let me in before the templars come back on their rounds."

"You need to leave." He lets go of the latch and steps away, filled with a vague, heavy foreboding. The familiar voice, the urgency in their words, the secret visit — he wants no part of this. He cannot risk the mages under his care. "Go, now, whoever you are."

"Oh, the hell with this," snaps the visitor. The door's latch freezes, then shatters into a pile of brittle shards before a small, dark-cloaked figure steps inside.

"Sorry about that —" his visitor says, reaching to pull back the hood of their cloak, but they pause when Orsino levels his staff at them.

"Get out," he hisses. His pulse pounds at the back of his mouth, adrenaline races through him. If the templars have seen — if this is an _apostate_ in his study —

It doesn't bear thinking about how much Meredith would enjoy that.

"Orsino," says the figure, their voice muffled now by their hood. They push the door closed. " _Please_." The hood falls away, baring a familiar face to the candlelight.

Orsino sucks a breath through his teeth, and lets his staff fall to his side. "Champion," he whispers, dismay now warring with his fear. "You cannot be here. If Meredith finds out, I cannot protect you."

Hawke laughs again, a broken, desperate sound. She looks wretched: eyes ringed by bruised shadows, her skin dull, but she stands straight before him, and her eyes glow, like cobalt under flames. "I know," she says. "And I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, but I need your help."

Orsino nearly shoves her out the door. Maker, he nearly shouts for the templars himself. She's the _Champion_. She walks the streets as a free mage, and Meredith can't touch her. What does she need his help for?

It's petty, it's jealous, and he can't help himself. She has everything, is everything that he can never be — what does he have to offer her?

Then he breathes in, slowly, and lets reason win out over jealousy. Fate, nothing more, has left Hawke free — and when Meredith would have left him and his mages to the qunari, Hawke defended them. She paid in blood to keep the city safe.

"You take a grave risk coming here, Champion," he says quietly, moving around her to peer out the door. The corridor is clear, for the moment, and the templars have little reason to patrol this part of the Gallows at night — but there's no reason not to be sure. "Meredith would be delighted to keep you here, if she knew you'd come."

Hawke nods. "I'm putting you in terrible danger," she says, twisting her hands together. "But I had no one else to go to. I don't dare put this in a letter, I don't know how closely they're watching me — Maker, they might not even be watching me at all, but…" She shudders, and smooths shaking hands over her cheeks. "Listen to me, I've gone all paranoid, but I don't know what's true or not, and —"

Orsino sighs. "Perhaps starting at the beginning would help?" he says, in the tone he reserves for the most frightened and mouse-like of new mages. It coaxes and comforts all at once, and it's rare for him not to gain a smile, however quavering, whenever he uses it. Hawke merely nods, a quick spasm, and goes back to twisting her hands.

Drastic measures, then. He slips behind his desk to draw a thick glass bottle from its drawer. "Antivan brandy," he says, lifting it. "Which means we won't bother with glasses. Here." He hands Hawke the bottle, and watches, impressed, as she drinks three fingers of it at a swallow. Coughing, she hands it back, then clears her throat.

"Thank you." Her hands have stilled; now she is the Champion he recognizes from a hundred pamphlets and songs: a small, charming woman, sweet-smelling and inviting. "I'm here because —" She falters, her eyes sliding away, then she steels herself and meets his gaze.

Orsino remembers Malcolm Hawke as more a vague rumor than a person. He saw Malcolm in the tower, tall and dark-haired, a strong, generous man — but his features run like water and refuse to hold their shape in Orsino's memory. But he would know the Hawke eyes anywhere, and while Templar Carver is an Amell to his bones, the Champion is fully her father's daughter.

"What do you know of the dream-sea?" Hawke asks, not blinking, as the words thicken the air between them.

 _The dream-sea_. The blood drains from Orsino's face, and his hands feel like they've been plunged into freezing water. Old magic, forbidden magic; the words leave the taste of too-ripe fruit on his tongue.

"Only a little," Orsino says, at last. "That is…not magic they teach in the Circles. Not anymore, not in the Free Marches, not in Orlais — in Tevinter, maybe."

Hawke shrinks into herself. "I know for a fact that they still teach it in Tevinter," she whispers. Even in the faint candlelight, Orsino sees tears beading along her lashes. She draws a sharp breath, almost a sob. "What I need to know is — is there a way to stop it?"

Orsino swallows, then reaches for the brandy himself. "Take a seat." He nods at a chair as he lifts the bottle to his mouth. "Tell me everything."

* * *

 ** _Six weeks earlier._**

There are worse uses for one's time than spending four frigid days on the Wounded Coast, acquiring chilblains and saltsores alike, though Hawke can't think of any. Maker help her, she welcomes Darktown's smell, simply because Darktown is both salt-free and partly shielded from the icy sea winds.

They stop at Anders' clinic to defrost and for Hawke to divide up the coin from the latest batch of armed idiots. At least this lot didn't hoard trash like half the bandits and mercenaries of the last seven years; everyone goes home with two fistfuls of silver.

Hawke watches until Merrill and Isabela disappear from sight, then aims her feet toward Hightown.

"You sure you'll be all right, Anders?" she asks, hearing his answer in her head before he opens his mouth. "You're welcome to come back with me, get some hot supper, sleep in an actual bed."

He shakes his head, not looking at her. "I'll be fine," he says, sitting down heavily on a cot and scratching at his stubble. "I should stay, in case anyone needs a healer. But thank you, Hawke. I'll see you soon."

She knows better than to argue; Anders managed to not start a single fight on this trip, besides the sanctioned one with the bandits, and he needs some solitude as much as she does. But the thought of him quietly freezing in his squalid little clinic tugs at her heart, so she can't help trying again.

"Just consider it," she wheedles. "A warm place to sleep, fresh bread, no threat of a templar visit in the middle of the night. What more could you ask for? Tonight, at least."

Anders laughs, then falls back on the cot, his legs stretched out and his hands folded behind his head. "Really, I appreciate it, but what I want right now is to be alone." He stares at the ceiling, almost smiling. "If any templars choose to come after me in this weather, they'll probably freeze first."

Hawke smiles, and tugs her hood a little lower over her face. "Point taken. Still, my door's always open for you. Keep that fire high."

"Yes, Hawke," he says, eyes already sliding shut.

The walk back to Hightown should take her no longer than an hour, but Hawke pauses at every fire pit to warm her hands and feet. She even relights those that have gone out with a quick cantrip, the movement of her hand hidden by her cloak. Anders is probably right; no templars would be stupid enough to leave their warm bunks in the Gallows to patrol on such a miserable near-dawn morning — but no sense in making herself obvious. No sense in daring Meredith's bad temper.

She amuses herself on the walk by reading the graffiti scrawled over the walls. Much of it is indecipherable, too many artists layering their works on top of those that came before until all that's left is a shapeless, colorless muddle. Every once in a great while, a word jumps out, naked without its context, but Hawke has been through these corridors enough times to have them all memorized.

All of them save the blood-red splash of ink on the wall of Old Harlan's stall. Old Harlan is curled in his bed, or more likely under a table at the Hanged Man, but the smell of burned sugar hangs around his stall, joined now by the smell of the ink, still fresh enough to drip down the wall. Hawke pauses, her sore feet and hands forgotten, and tries to puzzle out the symbol. It's badly smudged — the artist, whoever they were, drew their masterpiece in haste — but Hawke makes out what might be a snake, or a dragon, or something else entirely. She looks down the corridor, in all directions, and sees no one. Not even footprints mark the dust to show which way the artist went after they finished.

"Odd," she says to herself, then shivers as a great gust of wind barrels through the corridor and slips under her cloak. Odd indeed, but not odd enough to keep her standing in Darktown when there's a bath and fresh bread ahead of her. She'll tell Aveline about it the next time they see each other, in case it's a new batch of troublemakers trying to put down roots in Kirkwall. Perhaps then Aveline will stop harping about her civic duty.

Hawke forgets the cold completely in the pleasure that sweeps through her at the sight of her front door. No other door has given her so much joy, and little could delight her more than slipping her key into the lock, and stepping into the familiar warmth within.

She moves as quietly as she can, stowing her staff in its rack and tiptoeing through her foyer, but Nettle comes wiggling down the stairs, and lets out a sharp bark as she bounds to Hawke's side.

"Thank you for the welcome home," Hawke whispers. She stoops to hug the mabari, and presses a smacking kiss between her ears. "Now, let's hope you didn't wake the rest of the —"

"Ah, Mistress, you've returned!" Bodahn's night-capped head peeks around the corner, and Orana smiles from over his shoulder. Neither of them seem concerned with lost sleep as they bear down on her. "Welcome back! We didn't expect you till late tonight." He holds out his hands for her cloak before her numb fingers manage to undo its knot, then Orana herds her gently into the front parlor. "You just sit down, and get warm. I'll bring up the water for your bath."

"Oh, no, it's far too early for that, go back to sleep." Hawke steps over Nettle as the mabari sprawls belly-up in front of the banked fire. "I'll just get something to eat, then fetch my own water. Please, really, it's too early."

"Nonsense! Won't be but a moment, and you've been walking for days. Besides, we're early risers, aren't we, Miss Orana?" He scoops up her cloak and pack in one smooth motion, emphatically nodding at Hawke's empty chair near the fire.

"I'll just heat up some soup for you," Orana whispers, patting Nettle's head as she walks past.

Hawke grins back, not caring if her chapped lips crack and sting as she does. Simply walking through the door has her half-thawed. "You're too kind," she says, sinking into her seat as Bodahn scoffs and heads for the kitchen with Orana in his wake. "I hope all's been well here."

"Oh, it's been quiet," Bodahn replies as he disappears through the kitchen door. "I was going to take my boy down to see the ships come in, but then came the rain, so we just stayed here, snug as you like."

"I envy you," Hawke murmurs, tossing her boots toward the foyer. Her mana rises sleepily when she calls to it; a murmur later, the fire leaps and crackles against the bricks. Nettle leans against Hawke's leg, sniffs at her leathers eagerly, then nuzzles into Hawke's hand for scratches.

"Did you miss me?" Hawke rubs her thumb along the side of Nettle's snout. "Or are you just hoping I brought something back for you?" Nettle whines, and Hawke laughs. "Well, unless you count some silver, I don't have anything for you, I'm afraid."

"Oh, she doesn't need any more treats," says Bodahn, appearing at her side with a steaming mug of tea. Hawke huddles gratefully over its warmth. "Caught my boy sneaking bacon to her yesterday morning at breakfast. Shameful little beggar, she is."

"Yes, she is." Hawke sips her tea, not caring that it's still hot enough to scald her tongue. "And we indulge her, which is how it should be with dogs."

Bodahn sniffs, muttering to himself, then disappears back to the kitchen.

"Don't listen to him," she tells Nettle, as the dog slumps over her feet and sighs. "I'll ask Orana to set aside some bacon for you tomorrow morning, since you like it so much." Her coin purse digs into her hip, and she pulls it free with a grunt and sigh of her own. "Maker knows I can afford it."

She dozes, lulled by the fire and Bodahn's soft monologue in the kitchen, and only rouses when Bodahn approaches with a tray of sandwiches and a bowl of warmed potato and leek soup.

"Oh, thank you." Hawke straightens in her chair, dislodging Nettle, and reaches for her spoon. "Maker, this smells heavenly." She sends a mental _I told you so_ in Anders' direction at the first mouthful, and is just lifting a sandwich from the plate when Bodahn clears his throat apologetically. "What is it?" she asks, crooking an eyebrow.

"Your mail, Mistress," he says, fanning a set of letters on the table beside her chair. "I'd have let these wait, till you're rested, but you see, there's one here from that Alistair fellow, and that one there's from your brother. I thought you'd like to read them now, rather than waiting."

"Right you are," Hawke says through a mouthful of sandwich as she picks up Carver's letter. _Might as well get the unpleasantness over with as soon as I can_ , she thinks, scolding herself an instant later. At least Carver's _trying_ , in his own oafish way. He doesn't deserve any little jabs for his trouble.

The wax on the letter was broken, then resealed, with no care for hiding the intrusion. So Meredith's got her eye on Carver's correspondence _._ Hawke frowns at the wax _._ How lucky, two messages for the price of one. She breaks the wax, then presses the letter flat next to her soup bowl.

It begins promisingly, addressed to _Rhyssa_ and not to Carver's usual _Sister_ , and Hawke dares to smile at the handwriting, hopeful that this letter will contain no jabs of its own.

 _I hope you're surviving this Maker-forsaken winter well enough. Suppose I shouldn't worry too much, though, not with you in Hightown._

And there's the jab. Hawke sighs, and takes a ferocious bite of her sandwich before she reads on.

 _But that's as good a place as I could ask for. Warm and secure, just like Mother wanted. The barracks here in the Gallows aren't bad. Probably warmer, with so many of us in one room. The food's not bad either, but I am getting sick of turnips. I'd do anything for something sweet. Is Old Harlan still in business? I could eat his caramels by the fistful._

Now Hawke smiles at the letter in earnest. She can fold a few caramels into her reply, and pray that they make it through whatever inspection Meredith gives to any letters coming from her address. Old Harlan's caramels may be atrocious to everyone except Carver, but it would take a madwoman to see any blood magic in them.

 _A new group of recruits joined up last week. I never thought I'd feel old, but looking at them, I can't remember being that young and stupid. Half of them can't even hold a shield properly. Knight-Captain Cullen is going out of his mind trying to get them trained up. They're hopeless, even with Keran — you remember Keran — helping. He's not a bad fellow. Steady enough, despite his troubles way back when._

 _I didn't write this to complain to you. I just wanted to see how you were. Three years now, since we've seen each other, and you've gone to Ferelden and come back. Sometimes I think about Lothering, but I don't know if I'm remembering it, or just imagining what I want to be there. But you got to see it. Actually see it. Seems like I'm always going to be jealous of you, one way or another._

 _Stay warm out there. Write back if you want to. And tell that skinny elf of yours he still owes me four sovereigns._

 _Carver_

Hawke rolls her eyes — Carver and Fenris have argued over those four sovereigns for years, and no doubt will keep arguing until they're both dead — then rubs her thumb fondly over Carver's signature. Almost thirty, and he still writes his name like a child, taking up the rest of the page with a loopy scrawl.

As far as Carver's letters go, that was actually _sweet_ , and deserves rereading when she's not quite so hungry or sleepy. Hawke slips it back into its envelope, and sets it aside to look at the rest of her letters. Bills, invitations she has no plans to accept, a scented letter from Lady Elegant, a reply from a Denerim bookseller — she sweeps them all to the side, and pulls up the travel-stained, wrinkled envelope from Alistair.

His handwriting gives her heart a familiar pang. Hawke hasn't seen Alistair since their farewell in Jader, but his deprecating little smile is clear as a sunrise.

The letter is thick — she can't imagine what Alistair must have paid to have it sent overseas — and whatever the contents are, there's nothing she can do about them tonight. It will keep until she's cleaned up and slept, along with the rest of her correspondence. By now, Bodahn has hauled up enough water to fill her tub, and she's not so tired she won't be able to heat it herself. Someday, she'll manage Merrill's trick of using the moisture in the air — a boon on a night like tonight, when there's moisture _everywhere_ — but she has neither the patience nor energy for it tonight.

Once in her room, Hawke drops her letters on her desk and her muddy clothes in a pile on the floor, then picks up the clothes and tosses them in the hamper with a mental apology to Orana. Then, she pads naked into her bathroom, where a new fire burns merrily and candles glow beside the tub, and conjures a delicate blue fire in her palm before dipping her hand into the water. She scatters elfroot and mint across the surface, then slides in, groaning in relief. For the first ten minutes, Hawke simply _sits_ , and watches the dirt lift off her skin and float away. Then she scrubs away the more grimed-in smudges with a handful of finely-ground charcoal, and scrubs her hair until all the dried sweat and blood are gone.

Tempted as she is to reheat the water and soak a while longer, Hawke climbs out and drains the tub. She paid a king's ransom and half again to have the plumbing in the house updated, and she's never regretted it. The tub will need to be scrubbed out before she uses it again, but — she yawns, jaw cracking — that can wait till the afternoon.

Another cantrip, the close cousin of the one she used in Darktown, dries her skin and hair with the heat from the candles, extinguishing them at the same time. She carries the fire from the bathroom into her bedroom, cupped between her hands, and feeds it to the larger blaze, sighing as the warmth radiates through her room.

Sweet, blessed Orana slipped a bedwarmer under the covers; Hawke slides naked between the sheets, sighing and smiling. Warmth, soft sheets and blankets, and a merry fire; nothing but the right company could make this homecoming more pleasurable.

Hawke allows herself a moment of selfish regret over not letting Fenris know she had returned early. But telling him would require going back out into the rain and cold herself, or sending one of her household, and then making Fenris traipse across half of Hightown, just to make her sleep sounder.

No, better to anticipate seeing him tonight. Word of her return will reach him before noon, whether she sends a message or not, and then she can enjoy him guilt-free, with a side of moral superiority for spice.

Hawke rolls on her belly and wriggles deep into her pillows. The rain has one purpose beyond making anyone caught in it utterly miserable: thanks to the steady patter against her windows, she's guaranteed an easy journey into sleep.

 _Would've been easier with…_

She dozes before she finishes her thought.

* * *

The last time Hawke scandalized Orana was years ago, but the girl always knocks politely, a one-two-three rap, before opening the door, a measure Hawke finds both charming and prudent. When she's conscious, that is.

"I'm awake," Hawke murmurs into her pillow without opening her eyes. "Not really. I'm almost awake. But I'm not dressed."

A giggle floats under the door. "Serah Fenris is here, mistress. May I let him up?"

Well, that means getting dressed is not an immediate concern. "You may, Orana, thank you." _How sweet of Fenris to ask first._

"Good morning," she says when the door opens, without stirring an inch. "At least, I think it's morning."

"We're well into the afternoon now," Fenris says. The edge of the bed dips as he sits down, and Hawke presses close as she can without untangling herself from the covers. Her fire's long gone out, and though it would take nothing but a breath and a few drops of mana to fan it back to life, that means venturing into the cool air. Hawke would like to put that off as long as possible.

"When did you return?" he asks, fingertips tracing the shell of her ear.

Hawke starts out of a half-doze, then sits up, blinking in the gruel-colored light. "Late. Or early, I'm not sure." She rubs her eyes with her fists. "I'm thankful we didn't have to spend another day out in this rain and — Maker, you're all wet. Is it _still_ raining?"

Fenris kisses her before he answers, one hand carding through her sleep-mussed hair. "It's a mere drizzle now, though it'll get worse as the day goes on. What's _left_ of the day," he adds, with a meaningful arch to his brows.

Hawke yawns and rolls her eyes. "Please, love, spare me the lecture on how lazy I am. That's Aveline's job. Besides, you're not the one who just spent four days running after bandits on the Wounded Coast. I'm entitled to a little laziness."

"Point taken." A year ago, Hawke could never have imagined Fenris gently nudging her over to make room for himself on her bed, but now he does it without hesitation. Nor does he flinch when she folds both her arms around his, despite the chill damp clinging to his shirt, and nestles her head in the crook of his shoulder. He crosses his ankles and leans back into her pillows with a satisfied sigh. "And was your trip successful?"

"More or less. We cleared out the bandits, so the road to the city is clear, and everyone got enough silver to go home happy." She yawns again, hiding her face in his neck, grinning when he laughs. "What about you? Did you just play diamondback with Donnic the whole time I was gone?"

"Except for the nights I spent playing Wicked Grace with Varric and Donnic at the Hanged Man. You owe Varric two sovereigns."

"Oh, lovely." Hawke leans back to get a look at Fenris' face, but as usual, he gives away nothing. "You know, one of these days, I'll know right away when you're joking."

Fenris nods solemnly, without a glitter in his eyes or a twitch of his lips as a clue. "I look forward to it," he says. "Now, if you'll excuse the change of subject…" He slips his cool hand under the covers, smirking when Hawke gasps and shies away from his touch. "Four days, Hawke," he whispers, his mouth barely touching hers.

"Fenris, you —" The hand travels lower, stroking, and she surrenders, heat pulsing in her wrists and between her thighs.

 _I hope he locked the door_ , she thinks, before all rational thoughts evaporate under the touch of Fenris' obscenely clever hands.

* * *

She wakes in the middle of the night, to Fenris' even breathing and the ceaseless fall of rain against her windows. The fire gutters in a timid draft, and Hawke listens, half-asleep, to a faint rattle coming from the other side of the room.

"It's the window," Fenris mutters from under her hair. He stretches, the shift of his body against hers doing far more to wake her than any noise or draft, and blinks sleepily at her when she sits up, eyes bright as fireflies. "The latch must be undone."

"I'll get it, you stay warm," she says, slipping out of the covers and hissing when her feet hit the cold stones before the fire. "Oh, Maker, it's freezing."

"Teach you to check the windows." Fenris' voice is muffled by the pillows, but his smug little smile is loud as a shout.

Hawke glares at him as she turns to the fire, mixing breath with mana, but smiles herself as the fire growls back to life. "That's rich, coming from the man who distracted me from checking to begin with," she retorts, knowing Fenris is fast asleep again, and far past hearing her.

Latching the window would take no time at all, but Hawke takes a moment to peer out at the night. A few streetlamps stubbornly blaze through the downpour, though the rain has washed most of them away, and left Kirkwall a muted reflection of itself.

Hawke pushes the window open with the tips of her fingers. The chilly air flows in, dragging a thin, sharp hint of salt and rot up from the harbors. As she watches the empty street, another streetlamp shudders, and goes out.

A clear sign to go back to bed, if ever there was one, but Hawke stays at the window, filling her lungs with the salt-thickened air, her skin goosefleshed, until the sound of the waves reaches her ears.

In Lowtown, huddled close to her mother and Carver in musty blankets, the waves rocked Hawke to sleep more nights than she could count. Their street led right to the edge of the docks and the quiet, grey-green waters below them, but the sea is too far away for her to hear in Hightown.

The streetlamps make valiant little circles of light in the darkness, just enough for Hawke to make out the water filling the square beyond her house. Just enough for her to see the white fringe of a wave lifting on the other side of the square, and drop silently back into the dark lake that used to be her neighborhood.

A gust of wind drives icy rain into her face. Hawke shuts the window with a sharp crack, and casts a guilty look at Fenris, who stays completely still as her cold fingers draw the latch closed.

He has the right idea, staying curled up in bed. Hawke's minded to join him and steal some of his warmth, but her room smells of salt, and she still hears the bloody waves. Their murmured voices rise, calling her out of warmth and light.

Hesitating only a heartbeat, she slips out of her bedroom and into the silent, blue-black hallway. She takes the stairs at a near run, drawn to the front door by the formless, wordless voices. With every breath she tastes salt, and the waves are so close, so close she could be standing at the edge of the sea and feeling the water swirl around her legs.

Hawke's breath plumes before her as she reaches her front door; the house has lost the heat of the day's fires, and her nightdress is no armor against the frigid air all about her. She could summon a flame to guide and warm her, but her mana is slow to answer, and some quiet instinct warns her to leave it sleeping.

 _Best to avoid notice_ , she thinks. But the notice of what? She's the only soul stirring, possibly in all of Hightown. There's only her, and the sea.

Her fingers, chilled numb now, fumble with the locks but she manages them at last, her heart fluttering against her ribs, and pulls open the door.

The black waters crash against her steps, cresting white before dropping back into the seething, rippling lake at Hawke's feet. The hem of her nightdress soaks through in moments, and the rain leaves her hair in wet straggles in almost as quickly, but Hawke can't move. The sea has come to Hightown, with all its secret rots and salt-tangs, and someone should bear witness. Might as well be her.

Hawke doesn't know how long she stands on in her doorway, watching the waves build and fall, but it's long enough for her shivering to become near-spasms, and for the rain to drench her to the skin. She watches, colder than she's ever been in her life, and only when the waves creep up the steps and into her foyer does she think about going back inside.

But the sea is old, a god through all the ages of the world, and it won't let its audience go so easily. No sooner has Hawke taken a step back than the largest wave of all rises at the edge of the square, its edges fanning away into darkness, rushing toward her with a gathering roar. It comes too fast, swallowing every scrap of light, twice Hawke's height and more, and now it's not roaring at all, but laughing, a thousand voices laughing at once. The wave curves upon her, its crest white as teeth edging a black, laughing mouth, and she can't breathe, she _can't_ —

She slams the door closed seconds before the wave reaches her, her feet slipping on the wet tiles, and waits, ear pressed to the door, breath coming in gasps. The wave is coming. Any moment now, it will fall upon her house and she'll drown, cold and alone, in the dark, ancient water. She waits, and waits, until seawater pools around her feet and her shivers fade away.

Nothing. The only sound is her harsh breathing and the water dripping from her nightdress and hair. She counts silently to one hundred, to three hundred, to a thousand, and nothing comes.

Varric would tell her to leave well enough alone: keep the door shut, chalk the last however long up to bad dreams or bad ale, and go back to bed. Hawke's thoughts turn to her safe, warm room, to her safe, warm lover within it — then she yanks the door open.

The rain falls, steady and remorseless, into an empty square.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** This chapter contains graphic violence (content warnings for blood, body and facial injuries, and death).

* * *

Hawke wakes late, with chattering teeth, an aching head, and icy feet. Fenris and his body heat are long gone, but he left a note folded on her bedside table. She frees one arm from her cocoon of quilts and blankets, and then, note acquired, burrows deep in her blankets to read it.

 _Hawke,_

 _I have early business in the city and will return by sunset._

 _You shivered in your sleep. Stay warm today._

 _F._

 _PS: Varric insists we join him at the Hanged Man this evening._

"Well, it was nice having those extra silver, while it lasted," Hawke mutters, then kicks off the covers and shivers her way to her wardrobe. Clearly Kirkwall hasn't gotten the message that it's springtime and the cracks in the pavement should be filled with weeds and not half-frozen mud, so she's stuck with wool, wool, and more wool for a little longer. At least the clothes in her wardrobe have escaped the damp, and smell like lavender instead like saltwater. _Unlike everything else in this house_ , she thinks with one last shiver.

She chooses a wine-red dress for its warmth rather than its style, though it's trimmed in charming bits of embroidery in black and gold thread. The dress fits snugly at her waist and hips; she relied too much on Orana's stews and pastries to drive back the winter chill this year — but the red will be a welcome spot of color in dreary, rainy Kirkwall.

Once wrapped in wool from toes to neck, with her hair braided in a crown and her eyes and lips painted, Hawke considers breakfast. Her stomach began a plaintive, curious rumble while she painted her face, but as she turns to the door, thinking of herbed eggs and butter, her eyes fall on her pile of letters.

Her sigh drowns out her stomach's next rumble. If she doesn't read them now, then she'll never read them at all, no matter how invitingly Orana arranges them when she dusts.

 _Letters first. Then breakfast. After all,_ Hawke thinks, brightening, _one of the letters is Alistair's. I'll save that for last._

Most, however, are bills; sitting on her desk overnight didn't transform them into anything more appealing. Those she sets aside for her factor, and tears up half her invitations after glancing at the names. She sets Carver's letter aside, to reply to later, and hides the bookseller's reply in her desk. The books will arrive in two weeks, but she wants Fenris to be surprised when they do. That leaves her with Alistair's letter, and Hawke reaches for the packet with a half-smile. She'll read it over breakfast, she decides, as a reward for a job well done.

Her hand brushes empty space where the letter should be. Not even a careful survey of her desk and the floor around it makes the letter appear.

"Oh, really," Hawke says, brushing off her knees as she rises. "It didn't just _run away_. It must be —"

An unexpected gust of wind rattles her windows. Hawke jumps and reaches for her absent staff on reflex, then sighs. The letter probably fell down the side of her chair while she finished eating the morning before, and she'll find it as soon as she goes downstairs.

By the sunlight on the landing, she's missed another morning and noon entirely. The only sound past her footsteps is Sandal singing off-key to Nettle downstairs. Orana is no doubt at the market, being wildly underestimated by most of the merchants, and Bodahn can't be far if Sandal is still in the house.

"Bodahn," Hawke calls as she goes down the stairs. "Did you find a letter lying around? I've lost Alistair's letter and I — oh, hello there, Sandal." She braces herself against the bannister as Nettle bounds up the stairs and plants her heavy head against Hawke's hip, and smiles as the boy peers around a corner. "Have you seen a letter? A big thick one, with a griffon seal?"

Sandal edges into the front parlor, hands clasped behind his back, guilt in every flicker of his eyelids. "Moved it," he says, without looking at her. "Don't know where."

Hawke takes a deep breath. "Sandal," she says, hoping she's found the right balance between stern and gentle. It won't help to shout at the boy, even if he should know better than to move her things. "Will you please find it? I would really like to read that letter."

Sandal nods, eyes still on his feet, and shuffles back into the library. Nettle mouths at her hand, whining for scratches, then follows Sandal out of sight.

"Right then," Hawke says, with a sigh. "I suppose I'll read it over dinner." She heads for the kitchen, waving at each fire and candle she passes. Her factor will tear out his beard when he sees how much she's spent on wood this winter, but Hawke doesn't regret a copper of it. Kirkwall is bad enough, but the Wounded Coast can sink a chill into one's bones that lasts for days. If she shivered enough to alert Fenris, then high her fires will stay till the winter passes.

 _I've come this far without a cold. Here's to making sure it lasts._

After three years, her household finally agreed not to hold breakfast for her, but there's bread in the kitchen, along with boiled eggs, cheese, and cold bacon. Hawke eats standing at the kitchen window, watching two optimistic seagulls pick through the grey mud and dead plants that used to be her garden. The willow tree's branches droop low over a pile of marble in the far corner. Mother wanted —

She stops chewing, and swallows her mouthful without tasting it. For a blessed heartbeat, she stops shivering, too. She feels _nothing_ , and then, like an arrow finding its mark, the thought insists on being finished: Mother wanted a marble shrine in the garden, and three years later, the marble still sits in the garden, slowly being worn to nothing.

Hawke swallows her mouthful and scrapes the rest of her breakfast into Nettle's bowl. It would only taste like clay if she forced herself to keep eating.

Another gust of wind rattles the kitchen windows. She takes a moment to breathe, till the faint prickle in the corners of her eyes fades, then leaves the kitchen as still and quiet as she found it.

A near-empty square greets Hawke when she steps out into the misty afternoon, though a few hardy — or desperate — merchants have set up booths along the walls. The cider-seller and an Antivan glover are both doing excellent trade, but Hawke makes her way toward the chestnut stall, drawn by the warmth and the rich, toasted smell.

Humming to herself while she waits, she looks around the square, half-expecting a familiar face to leap out at her, and finds her eyes drawn instead to a blood-red sigil drawn above the gate to the Chantry. A dragon, or a serpent, bound by chains — just like the one on Old Harlan's stall.

Graffiti is hardly unexpected, even near the Chantry, but Darktown and Hightown rarely get the same artists.

 _A new mystery for Aveline. Just what she needs_. Hawke smiles at the thought of Aveline's disgruntled sigh, so preoccupied she doesn't mind being overcharged for her chestnuts.

She _does_ mind that the sky chooses to unleash a fresh burst of rain on Kirkwall before she reaches the Keep's steps, and has to endure the wet, cold slap of her clothes against her legs as she makes her way toward Aveline.

Hawke arrives in the barracks as the evening's guards file out of Aveline's office and the guard-captain herself scans the hall with calm, forthright eyes. Hawke steps into her line of sight, dripping from her hems to the stones, and smiles when Aveline waves her into the office.

"What've you brought me today?" she asks, sinking into the rarely-used seat behind her desk. "Any new disasters in Kirkwall I should know about?"

"That's a very grim way to view a visit from a friend." Hawke spins the only comfortable chair in the room to face Aveline's tiny fire. "I suppose you won't believe me if I told you that I wanted to see how you were doing? I _was_ gone for four days, after all."

Aveline rolls her eyes to the ceiling. "You've got that _smile_ , Hawke. The one that tells me I'm about to be up to my knees in sewage. So, out with it. Ruin my day."

Hawke tosses the chestnuts onto Aveline's desk. "They're still warm," she says as she shakes out her dress. "I had it in my purse, so the chestnuts should be fine."

Her friend hefts the bag, a look of horror dawning on her face. "Who did you kill?" Aveline asks, not looking away from the chestnuts. "Oh, Maker, who did _Fenris_ kill?"

Hawke nearly snatches the chestnuts back, and her reply is far sharper than it needs to be. "As far as I know, Fenris hasn't killed _anyone_. Unsanctioned, that is," she adds, before Aveline can give her the standard look of disbelief. "And as for me, I killed several bandits, but that was a _job._ One _you_ told me about. Anyways, it's a miserable day, so I decided to treat myself — and _you_ , but I'm starting to regret that."

She takes a deep breath, wills her ire down until she no longer feels it. It's this damn rain and cold. She's always short-tempered in winter.

Aveline doesn't do abashed or ashamed, but she does, on rare occasions, do chagrined. Hawke catches a quick glimpse of it now, a flash of apologetic green eyes, and then Aveline rustles open the bag and pops a chestnut into her mouth. "It's good," she says, as she chews.

Hawke relaxes back into her chair with a smile. "You're welcome. How were things while I was gone?"

Aveline shrugs, scooping out another chestnut. "The same, really. Had a bit of a disagreement on the docks between two Coterie groups who usually get along, but they'd taken care of each other before my guards got there. We questioned the survivors, got a load of gibberish. I'm keeping an eye on the area, so if you hear anything…"

"I'll make sure you're the first to know." Hawke takes a chestnut, then turns back toward the fire. What people will tell the Champion never fails to surprise her, and information is worth more than gold. One of Varric's lessons, that — one of his _true_ lessons. "What do you mean, gibberish? Were they too cut up to talk?"

"They were pretty bad off, but it wasn't just that, it was the _way_ they talked." Aveline chews slowly, frowning at her fingers as she drums on the desk. "Kept talking about the sea."

"Well, that's no surprise." Hawke tosses a chestnut into the air and catches it on her tongue, childishly pleased at the satisfying thud it makes. "You said the fight happened at the docks. The poor sods probably got it locked in their heads. Too many hits'll do that to a man."

"You think I don't know that?" Aveline says, without heat. "I was ready to pass it off too, and get them some healing — but they kept shouting about it. Couldn't get them to shut up."

"A pity they aren't _interesting_ lunatics," Hawke murmurs. "Were they drunk, perhaps? Or…" She thinks of Martin's long-ago cargo, then the Arishok's pretty little poison, and is just about to ask when the door to Aveline's office slams open. Two guardsmen try to enter at the same time, armor scraping together before one manages to push free. Hawke recognizes Brennan, but the guard trailing in after her is a pink-cheeked new recruit, with close-cropped blonde hair and a nervous smile.

"Guard-Captain," Brennan begins, before her gaze falls on Hawke. "Oh, Champion, we're sorry — forgive our interruption, but there's been another fight on the docks. We've brought them in, and wanted to make our report."

Over Brennan's shoulder, the new recruit's eyes go wide. Hawke gives her a little finger-wave, and the recruit's pink cheeks turn red.

"Apologies," the recruit murmurs, staring at her feet.

"That's all right, guardsmen," says Aveline. "Duty calls, Hawke. Unless you actually had a reason for stopping by?"

Hawke picks another chestnut out of the bag and rises, smiling brightly to hide the flickering annoyance in her belly. It's not Aveline's fault Kirkwall can't help coming apart at the seams. "Nothing that can't wait. I'll tell you all about it over a pint at the Hanged Man."

"I'll need to see this through, but I'll be there." Aveline herds her toward the door, past Brennan and the still-blushing recruit. "It's been a long day. I could use seeing you lose to Isabela."

"I don't _always_ lose to her!" Hawke calls as Aveline puts a hand on her back and shoves.

"Only when I'm watching." Aveline shuts her door with a pointed _snick._

And now, Hawke has no reason to linger in the Keep. She has hours to fill before she can expect Fenris back, but she can go bother Merrill, and make sure that she'll be in attendance at the Hanged Man. A walk might finally chase away the last of this chill, in spite of the rain. Decision made, she slips out of the barracks and back into the Keep proper.

The hall is twice as crowded as when Hawke arrived, and yet still manages to be just as cold. Only now, instead of the honest smells of wet wool and fur, there's sweat and fifty different perfumes to contend with. Hawke holds her breath, fixes a polite but empty smile on her face, and plunges down the stairs toward the door. A few people call her name, and she waves vaguely in their direction without pausing. If she can make the door without being trapped in conversation, she'll be free. The rain will be fair trade for escaping small talk.

Maker knows she loves to talk, but she prefers to talk about _something_ if she's going to open her mouth.

Her still-wet dress and cloak slow her as she dances through the crowd, smiling and breathing as little as possible — the current rage in scents is some nightmarish combination of pine, sandalwood, and lilac — and she still has one staircase to go when the doors open inward, and a host of templars march inside.

The Knight-Commander herself marches at the head of the column, not heeding the rainwater sheeting off her armor. The hall goes quiet for a breath, and then the whirl of conversation begins again, higher and louder than before.

Meredith is too astute a woman to let her opinion show on her face unless she wants it to, but Hawke feels the force of her displeasure, her _disdain_ and barely-leashed fury, as they approach each other. She keeps walking, one foot after another, and refuses to let herself wonder if one of the templars is Carver. What good would it do? She'd be more useful to him if she were dead.

Instead, when she draws abreast of the column, Hawke nods, and says, "Knight-Commander." Respectful, smiling, and in her place.

At the last possible moment, Meredith inclines her head a spare inch. "Champion."

 _I could burn you alive_ , Hawke thinks, once Meredith has safely passed. Voices surge in the hall, cutting off when the doors close behind her. It'll be gossip for a night or two in the taverns and parlors of the city, nothing more.

 _Nothing happened,_ Hawke tells herself, and tilts her face up to the cold rain. _You walked away. Nothing more, nothing less._

Walking to the Alienage seems too far a journey in this rain, with a thin shiver edging all her movements, so Hawke turns instead toward home, thinking not of letters or Knight-Commanders, but of fire.

* * *

Fenris announces his return with a hand on the small of her back. Hawke, twisted and bent to fit under the library table, yelps in surprise and bangs her head. There's a snort, wisely cut off, as Fenris' hand rubs her back.

"My apologies," he says, as she climbs out from under the table. "Did you lose something?"

"I got a letter from Alistair, but I've lost it," she says, trying not to sound as petulant as she feels. The day has thwarted her from beginning to end: she can't find her letter or Sandal; she didn't get to tell Aveline about the graffiti; she can't get warm no matter how high she builds her fires, and now she has a lump on the top of her head. "I think Sandal may have moved it, but I don't want to yell at him, and — Maker, it's _still_ raining? Bloody hell, I'm so sick of this —"

Fenris' brows draw together, and Hawke winces at the sullen echoes of her voice. "Sorry," she says, brushing a few specks of dust from her skirt. "I'm being an ass. How did your business go? Have you eaten?"

"No," Fenris says, brows still low. "And my business…went well."

Hawke waits, unsure if she should press. There's a secret little smile tucked into the corners of his mouth despite his frown, and her curiosity gets the better of her burgeoning sulk. "Oh, playing coy, are we?" she asks. A step forward brings her close enough to wind her arms around his neck, and she grins when he settles his hands on her hips. "Is it a game? Do I get to guess?"

"It will be revealed in time," Fenris says. He rests his forehead on hers. "Be patient."

"Fine." Hawke sighs. Then she brightens, and stands on tiptoes to kiss him. "If I have to be patient, it's for me, right?" Before he replies, she kisses him again, greedily and slowly. The day may have been shit, but an hour in bed would start off the night quite well. No one will mind if they're late. No one will expect anything else.

But then her stomach growls, she remembers she's had nothing to eat since the chestnuts, and Fenris maneuvers her toward their cloaks, their weapons, and the door.

Toward the rain, too, Hawke realizes, as she slips her staff under her cloak.

She doesn't often regret leaving Gamlen's house, but she regrets it every step of the walk from Hightown to the Hanged Man. Kirkwall's pocked streets are riddled with puddles, and her boots are soaked before they travel a half-mile. The chill she woke with bites deeper with each step, leaving her with a tremor in her belly, and numb hands and feet.

"What a miserable night." She huddles close to Fenris and blows on her hands. "I'm sorry for making you walk in this."

"There are a number of ways to make it up to me," he says, taking hold of her elbow to lead her around a puddle. "Perhaps by losing at Wicked Grace?"

"You too? Well, that'll be easy enough. You know my luck is dreadful." Hawke clasps his hand with cold fingers, laughing and holding fast when he hisses. Fenris has body warmth to spare, and she's not going to let any of it go to waste. He'll have to put up with her chilly fingers; it's not like she tried to shove them down his trousers.

"At least you have the grace to admit it."

Hawke freezes mid-step. "Was that a _pun,_ Fenris?"

He pulls her forward gently, his face hidden by his hood, but she senses his smile nonetheless. "Be astonished inside, where there's ale and no rain."

She lets herself be drawn along, snuggling into the steady curve of his arm. "I'm going to have to write this down, you know. _Dear diary: the love of my life made a pun. I was speechless for fully thirty seconds_ —"

"Unlikely," Fenris says, holding open the Hanged Man's door for her to step inside.

"Never say never," she replies, folding back the hood of her cloak and turning to smile at him as he does the same. She reaches up to push his rain-soaked hair out of his eyes with the tips of her fingers. "Stranger things happen every day, love."

Fenris heaves a long-suffering sigh, his own fingers working at the clasp of his cloak, but his eyes are warm, almost _tender_ , as they rest on hers. "Stranger things, indeed." For a moment, he looks as if he wishes to say something else — his lips part, and his brows draw low, and that near-tenderness turns both fierce and yearning — but Merrill calls their names, and waves them to a table in the far corner of the tavern. After a little shuffling and some complaining from Isabela over how they brought all the rain in with them, Hawke and Fenris are folded into the game and the warm laughter that circles the table.

The game goes as it usually does: Hawke loses her first three hands, narrowly avoids losing the fourth and fifth, and then loses everything on the sixth. Fenris gives her a knowing look as he rakes her coins into his own pile — how he manages to win _anything_ is beyond Hawke's comprehension, he's the most scrupulously honest card player she's ever met, yet even Isabela has trouble seeing his tells — and she frowns back as she rises to get another ale.

 _Perhaps some cheese as well,_ she thinks, threading her way toward the bar. _Maybe Corff's got some of those potatoes Merrill likes, and everyone could do with a plate of baked apple._

In the end, her wants haven't changed: she only wants her loved ones warm, and safe, and fed. Tonight, she knows they're warm, she's reasonably certain they're safe — provided no strangers join the game and take exception to Isabela's creative strategies — and she's absolutely sure they can be fed.

Corff gives her a lopsided grin as she leans on the bar. "Out already?" he says.

"Decided to cut my losses a little early tonight," she says, nodding at the barrels behind him. "That, and I wanted to see what you've got on the menu."

"Eh, nothing special. Bit of beef stew, left over from luncheon. Some taters left, and apples that're only good for baking now."

"I'll take it all." Hawke fishes for her purse. "Some toasted sandwiches would be lovely too, if you've got the bread for them."

"Aye. Ale, too?"

"That's what I like about you, Corff." She tosses a few coins onto the bar — more than the cost of the food, but Corff undercharged her that first year in Kirkwall, and she pays her debts. "Always thinking ahead."

"That's my job." Corff pulls a mug of ale, then slides it across the bar to her. "Food'll be up in a few minutes. Apples'll take a bit longer than the rest."

She scoops up the mug, breathing in the hops and smiling at the thought of maybe — _maybe —_ wiping the smirk off Fenris' face in the next hand, when someone touches her shoulder.

"Serah Hawke?"

She turns slowly, her smile freezing into the one she saves for nobles who make veiled comments about Ferelden mud in Hightown streets. "Yes?" she says.

The man before her is dark-haired, with features so smooth and balanced Hawke knows she'll forget his face as soon as he walks away. He's dressed in worn brown velvet, and smells like steel. And he smiles pleasantly down at her, with white, even teeth.

"You're lovely," he says, tilting his head at her. "Even prettier than they said."

"Oh, you're too kind," she says, moving to the side. He steps in front of her, and Hawke sighs. "And you are —?"

"No one of consequence," says the man. "Just in Kirkwall to do a job. Thought I'd stop by the famous Champion's haunt, see what all the fuss is about."

Hawke's all too aware of the tables at her back, how the man is blocking the most direct route back to her friends, and her hands itch for her staff. Not that she could risk magic here again; Meredith might have overlooked the fight with Danarius, but she won't ignore another.

 _Suppose I'll have to settle for throwing my drink in his face if he tries anything_ , she thinks. Behind her, Merrill bursts into giggles, and Hawke hopes someone's eye is turned her way.

"Well, I hope it's been worth your time," she says, smiling up at the man. Just a pretty fool, easily flattered and easily dismissed. "We aim to please here at the Hanged Man. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got a game to get back to."

"One more moment, serah." Still smiling, he throws his drink in her face.

In the split second before the ale falls on her skin, Hawke's only thought is _Oh, Maker, how did I manage to piss you off, too?_ Then the liquid splashes into her face, hissing like acid when it reaches her nose and mouth. Only the greatest of luck lets her close her eyes in time.

It doesn't hurt, which is a blessing Hawke barely comprehends as her mana flares in a cold blue-white burst, then drops away into silence.

One word echoes in her mind: _magebane_. Her only choice now is running, putting as much distance as she can between herself and this bastard, no matter how unsteady she is without her mana's song, no matter how slow.

Varric lets out a laugh back at their table, one brief, rough _ha!_ as the man backhands her, as casually as she would push aside a curtain.

The force of the blow drives her into the table at her back. Plates and mugs shatter around her, but there's no break in the roar of conversation and music. It's happened too quickly; even the people at the table she fell into have barely stopped talking. She hasn't started to hurt yet.

But the pain comes, as it always does, and the breath leaves her as white-hot agony sears through her face and head. The bastard didn't just break her nose, he _smashed_ it. If she could think, she would scream. But she can't, she can only choke and whine and taste the hot blood filling the back of her throat.

One gasping, agonized moment later, the man's booted foot slams into her side. Her ribs cave inward, and then all her breath is gone, forced out of her, and she can't clear her throat to draw another.

Her mana is dry and dead as an old bone.

The man laughs high above her, rich and gleeful and utterly, perfectly mad. Another kick, another rib splinters, and her lungs turn to hot coals in her chest. She can't scream, she _cannot scream_ , not even when he grabs a fistful of her hair and yanks her upright, just to hit her again. He's so fast, it's all so fast, people are just _now_ noticing, even though her blood must be all over the tavern.

Another blow. More blood. Something snaps in her cheek, close to her eye, and she manages to claw in one shattered breath and shriek. Feverish bursts of red explode behind her eyes and she can't breathe and everyone is screaming and he keeps _hitting_ her.

Now there's shouting all around her, while chairs scrape and mugs break and steel rings out bright as a song. Someone howls her name over all the noise, their voice breaking as it crests. She barely hears; a belated surge of adrenaline blankets her nerves, shoves down the pain, and lets her twists in the man's grasp, tearing out her hair by the root as she slams her knee into his belly.

He drops her, still laughing, and two pairs of hands drag her away.

"Come on, kitten," says Isabela, close to her ear. "Come on, easy now, you're all right —"

"My _face_." Bone grates against bone in her cheek, and she retches as the pain spikes again. But she can almost breathe now, and that's got to count for something. "Bela, he — I can't feel. I can't feel my —"

A tooth comes loose and rattles toward the back of her throat, and she spits it out along with a mouthful of blood. Her right eye is swollen shut and useless, but she forces her left eye open in time to see Fenris drive his fist into the man's chest, his face contorted in pure, blinding rage. The man doesn't scream, doesn't even gasp, but he clutches at Fenris' arm and throat like a lover, smiling as blood flecks his teeth.

"Let's go, Hawke," says Isabela, bearing her up easily. "Anders is here, you're fine. Don't talk, it's fine." Her words melt into a soothing croon, and her breath is blessedly cool on Hawke's flaming face. It would be so good to go with her, so good to let Anders' fingers send this pain back to the void where it belongs — but she can't tear her gaze away from Fenris as he yanks his arm from the man's chest, and lets the smiling, empty body fall to the ground.

He turns to face her, breathing hard, his armor stained with blood and his hand fisted tight around a dark, pulsing mass.

Her mouth doesn't work, and she's ashamed of the watery noise that leaves her when she tries to say his name. And still the pain grows, throttling her as the blood slips down her throat — _oh, no_ , she thinks, clutching at her throat, half-hysterical. _I can't be sick, not like this, Maker, please_ —

Fenris shoves Donnic out of the way, bloody hands reaching for her, but Hawke is gone, borne away by a dark and soundless current.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** This chapter contains implied depression, injuries, and trauma-related flashbacks that reference physical violence.

* * *

A greedy, dank darkness clings to Hawke when she tries to wake, like the brackish, sucking mud on the Wounded Coast. But wake she does, drawn upward by pain's relentless call.

The pain deepens as she wakes; the shallow breaths she manages scrape their way through a sore throat, and turning her head a mere inch sends a blazing wave across her face. Her right eye won't open at all.

 _Did I lose it?_ she thinks, muzzily. _Am I blind_?

The thought does little to concern her. A thick mist shrouds pain and worry. She's aware of how much she hurts, and she knows she _should_ be hysterical with worry, but nothing can reach her through the mist.

Almost nothing. A sticky taste like twice-burned sugar and dirt lingers in her mouth, and a raw hollow borders her heart. That hollow place sends a bolt of fear right through the mist to wake her fully, gasping and clutching at her chest.

"It's all right, you're fine, you're safe!" Rough hands grab her wrists and hold fast. Hawke glimpses a blur of gold hair and candlelight, but on its heels comes the image of a gauntlet, throwing off light from the fire as it drove toward her face.

She turns her head to dodge the blow, struggling against the hard grip on her wrists. The mist burns away, leaves her defenseless against all her pain and terror. The blood in her mouth, it's choking her, she's _choking_.

"Out of my way," snarls someone else, and the hands around her wrists let go. " _Hawke_. Can you hear me?"

The voice is gentler now, if unsteady, and familiar. Hawke tries to place it, but her head pulses in time with her fevered heartbeat and she can't remember who's speaking to her.

"I hear —" She cringes as the pain surges on the right side of her face, greedy as a flame. Her heart slows, soothed by the voice and the warm hand gently stroking her hair, but the emptiness around it remains.

"Don't speak," says the person touching her, so kindly, so lovingly. "Anders healed you, but you require more —" They break off, and in the silence, Hawke finally, shamefully, recognizes them.

 _It's been years since I heard you call Anders by name, love_ , she thinks, and turns her head carefully into Fenris' hand. He sighs, his breath warm on her skin.

Other voices whisper behind Fenris. Hawke's breath catches. For a moment, sheer dismal humiliation distracts Hawke from the pain radiating through every inch of her body: how many people saw what happened downstairs?

Everyone saw. Everyone saw her, defenseless and useless, a weak little mage too slow to get herself out of harm's way. The man's face looms large in her mind, swelling to fill her skull: handsome and bland and laughing, laughing as he hits her again, and again, and again.

The echoes of the blows linger in her spine, in the hot vises around her lungs, and in her broken face. Now the filthy-sweet taste makes sense: it's one of Anders' potions. He saves it for people who shouldn't feel anything for a long, long time.

Her humiliation crests, bitter and rough as sand in her throat, and she starts to cry — but without the breath for a proper sob, all she manages is a slow leak. Her tears track down her cheeks, cold against her hot, swollen skin, and the rustling behind Fenris grows.

"I'll talk to Corff," mutters someone — Varric, Hawke thinks — as a set of heavy footsteps pace away. The door closes, and still Hawke cries, silently, hating herself more the longer Fenris murmurs her name and strokes her hair.

"Rhyssa," he says, at the end, and Hawke cries harder, shuddering under his hand — how unfair of him, he _never_ uses her first name, and it undoes her completely now. When she opens her mouth to gasp, she feels air against the empty spaces where teeth used to be. She can't bloody open her right eye, her nose is a useless knot of agony.

And her mana is gone, torn from her like a tree ripped out by the roots. If she had breath to spare, she'd scream, and damn her broken ribs.

"Did anyone see him come in?" says Aveline. "Was he with anyone?"

"Not now, guard-captain," Anders stage-whispers. "Your investigation can wait."

"It bloody well can't." Her voice cracks like dry twigs underfoot. Hawke winces — she's too loud, Aveline, too loud by far — but her friend keeps going, voice implacable. "There's precious little to go on, the man's dead."

"Stop," Hawke whispers, between gasps. Fenris' hands pauses mid-stroke, and Hawke forces her left eye open once more. Her sight is blurry — Fenris is just smudges of color — but she can _see_. "No name," she says, ignoring the pain as best she can. "In Kirkwall…business."

A wash of red-gold and silver kneels beside the bed. Varric's bed, Hawke decides — that's a silk coverlet under her fingers. "What did he say to you?" Aveline asks, her voice mercifully hushed. "Did he say what his business was?"

Hawke shakes her head. The pain's locked her jaw shut, and the thought of trying to say another word makes her stomach clench. Shaking her head is hardly better: a fresh wave of dizziness almost makes her retch.

"She can't talk, can't you see?" says Anders. "Maker, Aveline, it can wait. She needs her rest."

 _I need you all to be quiet_ , Hawke thinks, but can't say. If she speak, she'll scream. Fenris' hand is so heavy on her head, so very heavy.

"I —" Aveline's blur stands abruptly. "Yes. I'm sorry, Hawke. Please…"

Hawke lifts her hand, twitches her fingers in a wave that means _It's fine_ and _Please go_ at the same time, and exhales slowly, relieved, when Aveline disappears from view.

Anders' blur immediately takes Aveline's place, and lifts a dark-brown mass into Hawke's line of sight. Her stomach twists — _Fenris' hand_ , _dark and dripping, something heavy falling to the floor_ — and she shuts her good eye. The mass is a bottle, and she knows the contents.

"Hold her head up," Anders tells Fenris. "Careful — yes, just like that. Hawke, this is going to taste terrible, but the more you drink now, the better you'll feel when you wake up."

 _It'd be hard to feel worse_ , she jokes silently. Fresh tears leak from under her lids. No, not ready to joke about this yet, not at all. She swallows obediently when Anders put the bottle to her lips, gagging as the taste floods her mouth, praying that the mist will come again and hide her from the last few minutes.

Fenris eases her back to the bed, his fingers brushing the hollow under her ear. "Rest, Hawke," he says.

She's hardly good for anything else, but she has no way to tell him that. Instead, she waits, silently, for the potion to take hold.

"Corff's cleared everyone out, but we should go now. Got a cart waiting." Varric's voice, wavering and far away. "You ready to carry her, elf?"

Fenris makes a scornful noise. Hawke almost smiles. She hadn't realized how comforting that noise was till this moment.

Vaguely, she feels Fenris lifting her, cushioning the uninjured side of her face against his chest, and then he makes his steady, unhurried way out the door. The potion tugs her down, into the clammy darkness from before, but Hawke welcomes it this time. She'll stay there as long as she can, away from the pathetic spectacle she's become.

The mist rolls over her, grey and quiet. The voices around her fade into nonsense. She knows nothing of the long, careful ride home.

* * *

Her second waking is far gentler. The mist rolls away, leaving Hawke behind like the abandoned shells and stones after the tide changes, but what pain she does feel is manageable so long as she doesn't move.

She's in her own bed, under layers of wool and silk, naked except for bandages wrapped around her chest and head, and she isn't alone.

 _Fenris_. She's too heavy-headed to say his name, but she makes some small noise, and a warm, rough hand curls around her wrist. Anders' hand, judging by the careful way it seeks out her pulse and doesn't weave its fingers through hers.

"How long?" she whispers, slowly, to avoid slurring her words. Speaking sends prickling heat through the right side of her face, but when no reply comes, she swallows — blood and dirty sugar, nothing unexpected — and tries again. "How long, Anders?"

The hand around her wrist tightens before letting go. "Two days since the Hanged Man," he says. "You woke here and there, long enough for me to get more potions into you, but not long enough for you to really know what was going on. A blessing, if you ask me."

 _I didn't_ , Hawke thinks _._ Experimentally, she tries to open her eyes. They both work, after a fashion. Breathing comes more easily now, though her nose is still a useless lump. Her ribs throb when she inhales, but they also itch, a sensation that's more comforting that Hawke ever imagined.

She's healing. A brief surge of hot relief clenches her hands into fists, until she realizes the hollow space in her chest remains.

Her mana is still a dead field around her heart. Hawke thinks of Lothering, of the fields poisoned and burned, and shuts her eyes before she can embarrass herself by crying again.

"This is going to sound like a ridiculous question," Anders says, "but I need a serious answer. How do you feel, Hawke?"

"Like hell," she mutters. Her lips are swollen and stretched tight, every word sends a new wave of heat through her face. Why is Anders, the _healer,_ making her _talk_? "Shouldn't you know that?"

He chuckles, a dry, exhausted sound. "I do know that, but I can't see everything right away. If something new hurts, then I need to know. And the sooner we get you talking, the stronger the new muscles and bones will be. Just a bit, don't overdo it," he adds, his voice a little lighter.

Hawke's far from ready to joke along, but she curls the left side of her mouth into a little smile. _Two days_ , Anders said, with her waking throughout. He must have been here the whole time, pouring mana into her. The least she can do is give him a smile.

"Is there anything?" he asks.

Hawke shakes her head, and immediately regrets it. Strange, how one can be so dizzy just lying on their back in bed. Through her good eye, she watches her dim room swim around her. The curtains have been pulled shut, but a fire and a few candles on her desk glow peacefully. Her room should not be this dark.

 _Think, damn you. Think._ A cunning, slow pain, not the vicious heat in her face and ribs, throws up obstacles whenever she tries to put more than two thoughts together. Her room should not be this dark. Where has the light gone?

The pin drops after what feels like an age. Her room is dark because her mirrors are gone, and the light they threw so cheerfully from one corner to the next has vanished with them.

A leaden, ashamed knot fills her throat. Is she really so delicate, so _vain_ , that someone had to hide what was done to her? The answer comes swiftly: yes, she is. She loved her mirrors, loved her reflection within them, and now she can take pleasure in neither.

"Do you want something to eat?" Anders hasn't noticed her distress; bitterly, Hawke realizes she can only credit that to her face being too battered for any recognizable emotions to show through. That, or she's too generally distressed for one kind to win out over another. "I'm afraid it's just broth and more broth for now, at least till your teeth grow back, but Orana is ready and waiting."

"Teeth." She has a vague memory of spitting blood, and something hard falling from her mouth. She shivers, claws at her sheets as her stomach lurches.

"It's all right." The exhausted note in Anders' voice disappears, to be replaced by faint alarm. "I shouldn't have said that, I'm sorry. You're doing quite well, all things considered."

She can't help a startled, mangled laugh. "Good for me," she says, hating the self-pity in her words, unable to hide it. "I'm so glad at least that's going well. But Anders — the magebane. How long?" She can't bear to press more, not while the song within her soul is absent.

Anders shifts, eloquent in his silence. "I don't know. Without knowing the exact mixture…I'm sorry."

Hawke rolls her head carefully in his direction. Her sight's not so bad that she doesn't see the regretful wince when he sees her face, but he gives her a tired smile and covers her hand with his.

"It's all right," she lies, with another attempt at a smile. "You've enough to worry about. I should try being a better patient."

"I've had far worse," he says, chafing her hand. "And you're one of the few who's never thrown up on my boots, so let it out."

"Was it Isabela?" she asks. "Who threw up on your boots?"

"Oh, she was one of many," Anders says. "But not because she was injured," he adds. "I'll tell you the whole story some time."

"Can't wait." Hawke's stomach rumbles. It's the only sound besides her voice and Anders', and now she's abruptly aware of what she hasn't heard, or seen.

"Where's Fenris?" she asks, heavy with a whole new reason to be angry with herself. "Is he all right?"

Anders' mouth thins, but he replies without his usual venom. "He's quite well. Probably pacing outside the door. I asked him to give us a moment alone."

Battered face or not, Hawke manages to give Anders a cold look. "And why do you want that?" she asks. "There's nothing we need to talk about that can't wait."

"The man who attacked you used magebane, and that's not a potion most people can get hold of easily," Anders says. "He knew you were a mage —"

"Like the rest of Kirkwall." Wherever Anders is going with this, Hawke has no interest in following. She wants Fenris, food, and a bath, in that order, not the newest edition of Anders' manifesto. No matter how grateful she is for all Anders has done.

"No one in power's moved against you," he says. "Not even the Knight-Commander. There's still balance. But now…Meredith will see this as a weakness she must exploit, and _you_ must be ready."

"Ready for what?" Hawke asks. She stares at the canopy of her bed, strangling her growing ire. "Anders, now is not the time. Would you ask Fenris to come back in?"

Anders' face darkens, brows drawn low and his eyes hooded. "Are you sure Meredith didn't have a hand in this?" he says. "Consider it. I'm not worried for nothing."

Hawke breathes slowly through her mouth, knowing by the steady throb in her jaw and cheek that she's talked too long. "Maybe not," she says, as gently as her raw throat allows. "But a templar wouldn't have to use magebane." All a templar would have to do is catch her alone, tired from yet another fight with bandits or slavers. A simple disruption, her body tossed into the sea — nothing would be easier. It's only a surprise that Meredith hasn't tried it before.

 _But I've never been alone_. There's always a friend at her side, or she's in a crowd, or safe within her home. Meredith may be holding on to sanity by her fingertips, but she's not clumsy. Not yet, maybe not ever.

Magebane is very clumsy. Magebane leaves a stinking mess behind — unless you have something to cover it up. Like blood, and a panic.

Hawke shudders, ribs creaking. The last thing she needs now is mystery, no matter how fixated Anders is on making her face it. If that makes her a coward, so be it.

"We'll talk later," she says. "Please, get Fenris, Anders."

Anders keeps frowning at her until she turns her head away, gingerly resting the flushed right side of her face on a cool pillow. Then, he rises with a quiet sigh, gives her a light, stubbly kiss on her forehead, and crosses to the door.

She has time to draw a single breath before the bed dips under a familiar weight. When she opens her eyes, Fenris — tired, worried, beloved Fenris — fills her sight.

"He shouldn't have told you to leave," she says, then winces when her jaw sends up a fresh wave of heat. Fenris' face constricts, a new layer of worry shading the old. "You must be tired of these vigils," she says, through a tight throat. "Isn't it time for me to fuss over you? Not that I want you to be hurt — oh, _Maker_."

It isn't pain that makes her pause, but revulsion: her jaw feels _slippery_ , and the thought of speaking any longer horrifies her. Fenris, still silent, touches her good cheek with the tips of his fingers.

The sensation passes, not before a few tears make their way down her cheeks. Hawke brushes them away, careful of her bruises and the bandage wrapped around her head, and gives Fenris her new half-smile. "I hope you don't regret waiting around till I finally woke up," she says, as brightly as she can.

"My only regret is not moving faster," Fenris says, voice clenched tight as a fist. "I should have…" He lowers his head, hand still on her face. "Forgive me."

He killed the man who attacked her, and he's _apologizing_? Hawke almost laughs. "There's nothing to forgive," she whispers. "You were there."

She's going to cry again. She's going to cry, like a weak little girl, and she can't stand herself any longer. Fenris shouldn't have to deal with her tears, on top of everything else. Maker knows she's taken enough years off his life by now.

"Not soon enough."

Fenris is as stubborn a man as she's ever known, but never more than when it comes to blame. "You shouldn't have needed to be there to begin with." Only a few words are left to her, but Fenris must hear this. "I should have thought faster, been faster. Not needed to be rescued."

A muscle in her jaw twitches, sends pain twisting down her neck. She holds back a gasp by the barest margin. Fenris gives her another look that's equally fierce and tender, but stays silent for a long time.

Long enough for the dregs of Anders' potions to fade, and for the depth of the emptiness within her to become blazingly clear. She's drained her mana in the past, and been left shivering and dreamless afterwards, but this isn't over-extension, this is _absence._ Her mana has been scooped cleanly out of her, without leaving a trace behind.

It strikes Hawke that Fenris may prefer this version of her: the curse of her magic is gone, but she herself remains. Herself, unspoiled.

 _Unfair_ , she tells herself, and turns away from the thought with a shudder.

At last, he asks her if she's hungry, a question she can answer with a simple nod. He leaves her long enough to go to the door and whisper to someone outside, and moments later, Orana appears with a bowl of steaming broth.

Fenris eases her up to sit against her pillows, pausing whenever dizziness leaves her gasping. When she's upright at last, Orana tiptoes forward with the dark bowl held in both hands.

The rising steam soothes away the worst of the aches in her cheek. She breathes in deep, humming with pleasure as her breathing eases. Mother always did claim that chicken soup was good for all ailments. Hawke sits back, careful to keep the bowl balanced, then catches her reflection on the surface of the clear broth.

Mottled bruises cover the entire right side of her face and neck. Her right eye is nearly obscured by swollen flesh, and a shiny, raw patch of skin gleams on her temple.

 _And this is_ after _days of healing,_ she thinks. The scream builds in her chest, but she shoves it down, and down, until the urge to let fly the jagged sound diminishes into something she can ignore. _I will not scream. It's just a face_. _I'm alive, and that's what matters. I need to stop being a vain twit and eat_.

Fenris is watching. She lifts the bowl to her mouth, and keeps her eyes closed until she finishes drinking every drop.

* * *

After two more days of broth, fitful dozes in between healing, and waiting for any sign of her mana to return, Anders judges Hawke to be fit for visitors, and her relief briefly overwhelms any qualms she might have over being seen. She's as starved for fresh faces as she is for sunlight, and there's little chance of her getting much of the latter. The thin sliver of sky she sees from her bed is the color of slush, and she doesn't think she'll ever be rid of the sound of rain.

Hawke feels a little of Fenris' coiled tension ease at Anders' pronouncement. For the past three days, Anders and Fenris have communicated in nothing but glares and monosyllables, with any belligerent hostility resolutely crushed — or, at the very least, deployed while she's sleeping — but she senses how Anders' presence picks at the edges of Fenris' composure. The signs are small, a stiffness in his replies, an extra layer to his silence, but her guilt compounds every hour. If she hadn't been hurt —

"It's as good a time as any to test your legs," Anders says, fixing her with an assessing look. "If you think you're up for it, Varric and Isabela are downstairs — and there's something you should see."

He gives her a maddening little smirk, but Hawke refuses to take the bait. Her recovery will be free of mysteries, even the friendly kind. Anders can go stuff his hints. "I think I can manage a walk, if you don't mind lending me your arm," she says, turning from Anders to Fenris. "Getting downstairs doesn't seem too onerous."

"You haven't walked more than a step in almost five days," Anders says, still with his little smirk. "Don't jinx yourself."

"My arm is yours," Fenris replies, not casting a single glance in Anders' direction.

Swinging her legs over the side of the bed is easy, but she hesitates before lowering her feet to the floor. For four days, her bedroom has been her entire world: safe, dim, and quiet. Anything beyond her door is a question mark — not quite a mystery, but an uncertainty. So long as she stays in bed, no one can see her, no one can hurt her. If she goes downstairs, there's no telling what will happen. Better to stay in bed until she's ready.

 _And when will that be?_ _A week from now, or a month? Face it now and get it over with. Don't be a coward._

Fenris' thumb sweeps over her knuckles. They have so little need for words; he can find all the answers he needs when she meets his gaze. If she wants to stay in bed, Fenris will not argue.

But Anders will, and that'll end the tenuous peace between him and Fenris. That thought, more than any real eagerness to go downstairs, is what makes her stand, and let Fenris help her into a heavy wool robe.

Anders' assessment of her strength was entirely accurate: her legs tremble by the time she reaches the landing, and only Fenris' strong arm keeps her standing. Twice, she nearly gives up and turns back to her room; the landing is too bright after so long in near-darkness, and far too cold as well. She's as exposed as a goldfish in a shallow pond.

The moment she reaches the top of the stairs, Varric turns away from the fire, and calls her name, his voice so warm it borders on joyful.

"Hawke! Good to see you!" The dwarf hustles to the bottom of the stairs, grinning. "Another hour and I'd owe Rivaini five sovereigns."

"You bet on Hawke's recovery," says Fenris, flatly unamused. Anders makes a disgusted noise at Hawke's shoulder.

"It was a _friendly_ bet." Varric shrugs without taking his eyes from Hawke's face. Watching for her reaction, she guesses, and far more worried about it than he's letting on.

Perversely, Hawke's relieved. Varric and Isabela's ridiculous bets are _normal_ , a part of her life before she saw fists coming at her face whenever she closed her eyes. They could have bet on the color of her bruises, and she'd be grateful for the scrap of familiarity.

Her face twinges when she tries to smile back at Varric, pain arcing through her cheek and past her ear. Maybe not her bruises, then.

"Only five sovereigns?" she says, stepping down to the floor. "That seems low."

Varric opens his mouth, but it's Isabela who replies, popping her head around the side of Hawke's chair by the fire. "Oh, we started at one when Anders said you'd make an appearance, and it's gone up every hour." She pouts in Hawke's direction and tugs at an earring. "If only you'd stayed in bed another day."

Hawke huffs. "Sorry to disappoint."

Isabela keeps pouting, even while relinquishing Hawke's seat to her, then leans against the side of the fireplace. Fenris takes the only other seat by the fire and draws it close, leaving Varric and Anders to take up places on either side of the fire.

No one speaks.

Hawke spends far too long staring at the fire, wishing she were still in bed and unreasonably annoyed it's fallen to her to play hostess. Surely, after seven years together, they can start a conversation on their own.

She ignores an itch under her bandages, and sighs. The rain patters distantly, endlessly against her windows, and unless she wants that to be the only sound she hears, she might as well try to get them talking.

Besides, she considers darkly, it's her fault they're not talking, isn't it? There can only be one thing on their minds, but they're awaiting her cue.

"So." Hawke digs her fingers into the arms of her chair as everyone's gaze turns toward her. "What do I need to see?"

Isabela pushes off the wall with a sly grin that doesn't quite mask her impatient relief. "Oh, we've been _waiting_ to show you this. No, stay where you are, just give me a candle or something — yes, that's perfect," she says to Anders, as he conjures a bluish flame in the palm of his hand.

Hawke's mouth goes dry with envy as Anders' mana brushes against her. Nothing stirs in her at all, though, and she watches with hungry eyes as he follows Isabela and Varric toward the foyer. She rubs at her breastbone absently, dropping her hand when Fenris glances her way.

"News travels fast in this city," Isabela calls from the dark foyer. "Varric and I have been your gatekeepers — a lovely job, by the way."

"How wonderful for you," mutters Hawke. "Wait, what do you mean, gatekeepers?" She squints to follow Anders' flame, then sucks in a breath when the light falls on a squat wooden cask. "Maker, what is all this?"

Isabela bumps her hip against the cask, smirking. "Come and see," she says, her voice an irresistible dare.

 _It's not a mystery if it's ten steps away,_ Hawke tells herself, and rises slowly. Fenris' hand brushes the small of her back, a wordless reminder of safety, of certainty, and despite her still-weak legs, Hawke walks to the foyer without issue.

"Is that…Fereldan red ale?" she asks, her mouth dry for a whole new reason. Maker knows she'd barely be able to taste it with her nose still swollen, but the flavor glows in her memory. They drank that ale on the farm in Lothering, even Mother.

"Certainly is," says Varric, rapping his knuckles against the cask. "Lirene — you remember her, Fereldan Imports? She sent it over as a get-well gift."

"I see." Hawke, rubs her sore cheek until she winces. "She's done well for herself," she adds inanely, unsure how to feel. On one hand, she's missed _real_ ale, but the memories of the farm sting, and she has a sinking feeling about the reason _why_ the cask is taking up space in her foyer.

"Damn well," agrees Varric. "But that's not all. More light, Blondie."

"Not all?" Hawke fists her hand in the collar of her robe. "I — oh."

Trunks, sacks, and boxes fill nearly every inch of the foyer. She and Fenris stand in one of the few empty spots.

"What's all this for?" Unease sours her stomach; she knows the answer, and she wants none of it. Not the ale, not the Antivan leather boots sitting on top of what can only be a _fainting couch_ , none of it.

"Kirkwall's enraged on your behalf," says Varric, far too reasonably. "And so the residents have sent a few…trinkets, to wish you well."

Hawke tears her eyes from a portrait of Divine Beatrice to glare at Varric. "Trinkets?" she says, hearing her voice rise and crack, feeling Fenris' hand settle around her upper arm. She tugs her robe tighter around her chest and tries to breathe evenly. "These aren't _trinkets_ , they're — "

There's a long, wavering moment where Hawke thinks her scream will finally escape; she bites the inside of her cheek until she tastes blood to keep herself silent till the threat passes.

"It's very kind," Hawke says, when she trusts her voice again. She isn't lying. The gifts range from thoughtful to ostentatious, and no doubt more than half of them were sent as status symbols, but they're kindnesses nonetheless.

How can she explain that if she had a drop of mana in her, she'd set it all aflame? A fainting couch and a new set of armor won't give her that night back. Nothing in this room can help her rebuild the lazy, peaceful warmth she'd started to call her own. Maker, but she's a fool. She thought things might be getting _easy_.

How wrong she was, yet how selfish she is to hate the gifts in front of her.

Isabela scoops up a bottle of perfume and tosses it in the air, catching it one-handed. "Kind's one word for it," she says, as Anders finishes his circuit of the room and comes to stand beside her. " _Desperate_ 's the one I'd use." She flips over the card attached to the bottle's cork. " _To the Champion: a reminder._ Ooh, naughty."

"You wouldn't believe who's come by," Varric breaks in. "Hence Rivaini and I playing gatekeepers."

"Bloody vultures," mutters Fenris.

"Which is why I don't feel guilty accepting this largesse on Hawke's behalf." Varric waves at a trunk brimming with bolts of silk. "Whenever we tell someone to get lost, they try to buy their way in. It's almost funny."

"Almost," Hawke murmurs.

Varric shuts his mouth.

" _Anyways_ ," says Isabela. "No one's getting in till you say so. Until then, why not take advantage of some…misguided generosity?" She tosses the bottle one last time, then uncorks it to take a sniff. "Oof, this smells like hot compost."

Anders startles. "Cork that," he hisses. "Dammit, don't you know what that is?"

"Someone regifting gone-off perfume?" Isabela corks the bottle, then wiggles it in Anders' direction. "What?"

"You idiot, that's magebane."

Fenris' hand tightens on Hawke's arm, but she barely notices. She's gone cold, every inch of her freezing save the swollen skin on her face. "Let me see," she says, unable to take her eyes from the bottle.

"Hawke, don't!" Anders shouts.

"It can't do me much harm now, can it?" she whispers, her pulse like thunder in her throat. "Isabela, let me see."

The bottle is heavier than she expects, thick violet glass etched with spidering, curving lines. Hawke traces the lines with her thumb, squinting to make out the symbol.

Heat surges through her the moment the symbol clarifies: a chained serpent, fanged jaws spread wide. Fenris says her name, again and again, but she's far away, feeling her mana die once more as the man laughs, and pulls back his arm to strike her. Such cheerful, casual malice, as bright as the light shining on the curve of the bottle.

 _A reminder_.

"Who brought this?" she asks Varric. Her lips aren't just swollen now, but numb, and she can't hear her voice over the roaring in her ears. " _Who_?"

She's shaking so hard her teeth chatter. Fenris won't stop saying her damned name, like that will help anything, but no one answers. No one can tell her _who_.

The gauntlet swings toward her, the reflected firelight dazzles her eyes. Hawke opens her mouth to scream, far beyond caring about the pain. No sound escapes her, none at all, and why would it? She can't scream, she can't make a sound because her throat is full of blood and her mana is gone and she's going to choke to death before anyone knows what's happening —

Her scream bursts out of her, five days delayed, so loud it strains her ribs and scrapes her throat raw. She throws the bottle with all her strength at the far wall. It shatters, the potion within hissing sweetly as it drips from the wall to the floor.

" _Hawke_ ," says Fenris, as if she just stabbed him.

She drags her hands down her face, unable to look at him, unable to look at anyone. But they're all staring at her, wide-eyed, open-mouthed, and silent.

"Get —" Her voice stutters out of her throat, a crumbling ruin. "Get Aveline," she says.


	4. Chapter 4

Hawke's scream left her light-headed with sudden, painless clarity, and she prays, heart opening like a rose, that this will be the moment her mana sparks once more to life.

It does not. Her mana stays empty as a dry riverbed.

 _A reminder_. The taunt sears across her mind, each letter written in fire. What need does she have of a reminder? Each bruise and cut is far more eloquent than what lies in glittering pieces across the room. And the scorched ring around her heart, the dead earth where nothing can grow — no, she needs no reminder.

This is pure, petty malice. The man laughed at her, and somewhere, someone is laughing still.

She swallows, hands clenching into fists, and watches the magebane spill down the wall in fat, lazy drops. The smell hangs in a low cloud over the foyer, cloying and rotted all at once, and oh, how did she not smell this at the Hanged Man? How did she not _know_?

Stupid, vain little Hawke, with a little magic and a great deal of foolishness. Not even a little magic, now.

"Please," Hawke says. "I need to talk to Aveline."

Varric's already pulling on his cloak. "I'll go — been a while since I was at the Keep, anyways." He's trying for reassuring, but there's a shocked note in his voice no good cheer can hide. When Hawke glances toward him, his tentative smile slides away, leaving nothing but heavy concern.

The magebane pools on the carpet, catching the light of Anders' flame like oil upon water. Hawke still feels the bottle in her hands, greasy and cool.

"I need to — to wash my hands," she says, to no one at all, as the door closes behind Varric. Without waiting for a reply — if _Isabela_ hasn't spoken by now, no one's going to — she turns, unsteady as a drunk, toward the parlor and the stairs beyond it. Fenris reaches toward her, but she evades his touch, arms crossed over her chest, and climbs the stairs alone.

She's behaving abominably: screaming like an idiot, tossing out demands, then running away to her room like a sulky child. Hawke should go downstairs and apologize, and start acting like an adult, but the sickroom hush of her bedroom envelops her, and she closes her door on the murmurs rising from the foyer.

 _At least they're talking now,_ Hawke thinks as she moves toward the bathroom.

She lights a candle from the fire, and carries it with her to the washbasin. A flicker of light and movement darts past the edge of her vision, and Hawke turns her head to confront her reflection in the full-length mirror fastened to the wall. The one mirror, it seems, that no one could remove.

Her face isn't quite as alarming as the last time she saw herself; Anders' healing has brought back the familiar curves of her cheekbones and jaw, and her nose actually looks like a nose again, but scars bloom lush and vivid all along the right side of her face. If Anders' magic hadn't banished them by now, she'll wear them for the rest of her life.

She has no lack of _reminders_.

Hawke tears her gaze from her reflection. The water within the basin is cold, the soap slimy and chill on her hands, but she keeps scrubbing, and keeps her back to the mirror.

A soft knock sounds at her bedroom door. Whoever stands on the other side doesn't wait for her to reply before entering — Anders, most likely, Hawke tells herself as she lathers her hands one last time, come to scold her for overexertion, for undoing his hard work. Really, he's spoiled for choice.

"If you're here to lecture me," she says without turning, "can it wait for a moment?"

"I have no lecture," says Fenris, from the doorway.

Hawke drops the soap into the basin, soaking the front of her robe. "Oh," she says, foolishly. "I didn't think — I —"

"— that I would come," Fenris finishes for her, in a flat voice that could mean anything at all. "I did not want to intrude, but you remained so long…" He makes a short, graceful gesture with one hand, and leans against the doorframe.

How long had she been up here, staring at herself in the mirror? She won't like any answer she gets, so she doesn't ask, and reaches for a towel to dry her hands. "I'm sorry," she says, watching the soft linen crumple between her hands instead of Fenris. "I'm acting like a child. You shouldn't have to come running after me, or —" _Or wait for me to wake up, or any of the thousand things you do for me._

Hawke tosses the towel aside, rakes her fingers through her hair. The greasy sensation still clings doggedly to her fingers. She ignores it as best she can.

"I'm sorry," she says again, knowing all too well how hollow it sounds, in the face of Fenris' silent, unending patience.

"Do not apologize." His eyes glow gently in the firelight. "You were attacked, Hawke."

"I've been attacked before," she counters, lifting her chin. "My little dance with the Arishok alone puts this to shame — not that I remember much of that, thank the Maker — so why this? Why am I so…" Her jaw twinges, and Hawke lets the sentence fade.

Now Fenris' eyes flash as he tilts his head, a frown creasing his brows as he tries to catch her gaze. "I will explain the difference between a duel with a qunari warrior and the attack," he says, almost lightly, "if you wish. Though it should be obvious."

"Should it?" Hawke shoves down the urge to wipe her palms on her robe. "I could have run, or yelled for help — oh, but how would that have looked, the bloody Champion of Kirkwall, mewling like a lost kitten —"

If she keeps going, she'll end up laughing, or screaming again, and she'd like to avoid both. It isn't until her eyes prickle that she realizes crying is another option, the worst option, and she turns back to the basin before the first messy sobs escape her. If there's one thing Fenris never needs to see again, it's her weeping.

"I'm sorry." She wipes the tears away with the cuff of her robe, heedless of her bruises, trying to catch her breath. "I don't —" she says, around a hiccup. "I'm ridiculous and I know it, but I don't want you to have to watch me act like this."

Fenris always moves silently, unless he chooses not to; she startles when he strokes the nape of her neck, but within a breath, she leans back into his touch. It feels like an age since they've done more than hold hands, and as starved as she was for sunlight and conversation, Hawke is far hungrier for the simple promise of Fenris' warm hand against her skin.

"If you wish me to go, I will." Hawke hears him inhale slowly as his hand slips away, and he doesn't move until she shakes her head. Then he sighs, tired and relieved, and embraces her from behind. She clutches at his hands, not caring how her ribs ache as she pulls him closer, needing only to feel as much of him as she can.

The storm passes quickly — her capacity for misery isn't deep, and the last week has exhausted it. While it lasts, her sobs wrack her entire body, but Fenris holds her steady, even when she sways, seasick and dizzy, and would have fallen.

When she's done crying, and breathing in long, flat inhales to calm her heart, Fenris finally speaks.

"How can I help?"

She gives in to a weak laugh, blinking the last few tears from her eyes. How clean she feels, how light, as buoyant as a prayer. "I'd say you already did, Fenris," she tells him, weaving her fingers through his own. "You're far more useful than I am."

" _Hawke_." Fenris doesn't need to shout, but there's force in his voice yet, rumbling out of his chest and through her body. "That… _attack_ , was entirely unprovoked. Do not blame yourself for not being able to defend against it." A pause, another sigh. "I should have moved faster," he says, the force fading.

"Oh, no, _no_ ," she says, forgetting her aches and tears as she turns around in his arms. "Listen to me, this," she waves at her face, "was not your fault. You don't get to play the blame game. You couldn't have known, it — oh," she finishes, blinking owlishly at Fenris as he smirks down at her. "Clever elf," she says, her throat tight.

"I have my moments." His eyes move over her face, still a little grim, and more than a little regretful, but he lets her soothe away the line between his brows with her thumb. "Varric should return with Aveline shortly. Are you ready?"

Hawke nods as she pushes her hair out of her face. She wants a bath, badly, but she'll have to settle for a comb and a change of clothes. Mercifully, the urge to wash her hands one last time has faded with the worst of her shame. "I suppose I should get changed," she says, and reaches for the sash of her robe. Before she unties the knot, he presses one fingertip to the unbruised side of her mouth.

Hawke lets her eyes close for a moment, enjoying the uncomplicated warmth of his touch. On opening her eyes, she lifts her own hand to his mouth, and presses her fingers there. It's far less than what she wants, what she craves, but she feels something in Fenris loosen when she touches him, and it's enough. For now.

* * *

"Aveline's not coming," says Varric, when Hawke and Fenris walk into the parlor. He turns his palms to the fire. "She wasn't even in her office when I arrived — looks the rain can't keep the Coterie down."

"Another fight?" Hawke tries not to let her frustration at being thwarted, _again_ , show in her voice. The tender skin by her eye aches as she frowns, but Orana's appearance with a tea tray distracts her. She glances at Anders guiltily as she takes her first sip — cream and sugar being far from broth — but he's watching Varric, and seems unconcerned that she's broken this particular rule. "You'd think they'd wait till after the rain stops to get into trouble."

"I don't think _trouble_ 's quite the word for whatever's going on down there." Varric scratches his chin, and accepts his own mug from Orana. "But our darling guard-captain will set them straight, not to worry."

Isabela _brrs_ into her mug. "Better her than me. I don't envy anyone outside tonight — oh, lovely, thank you." She wipes the water droplets from her arm, glaring as Varric smirks and flicks more water from his cloak at her.

"Do you think Aveline needs a hand?" Hawke asks, relieved no one seems inclined to bring up the last hour or so. It's as much for their benefit as hers — no one wants to risk another screaming fit —but for the moment, she's selfishly glad she isn't the only disaster in Kirkwall.

Varric shrugs, his attention back on the fire. "Word at the Keep says she's got things pretty well under control. And you know how she feels about us stepping in uninvited." He gives Hawke a pointed glance, as if to say _don't think you'll be getting involved, one way or another_.

"I vote for staying inside, in case anyone's counting." Isabela flops into a chair, swinging her legs over the arm and letting the hand holding her mug dangle toward the floor. "But you _could_ get us all caught up on what bothered you so much about that bottle, Hawke. Besides the obvious."

So much for escaping the conversation. Hawke feels four sets of eyes fall upon her, curious but not impatient, and knows she could cut off their questions with a single word.

 _And what, exactly, would that help?_

A faint rill of anger reaches her, barely more than a throb of heat in the back of her head: it wasn't enough that she was attacked in public. She had to be humiliated in her home, too.

Hawke sets her empty mug aside, and scrubs her palms on her dress. While she's picking over her words, Fenris presses his hand to the small of her back.

The story takes less time to tell than to lose a hand of Wicked Grace: the graffiti in Darktown and on the way to the Chantry, how she planned to tell Aveline about it, and finally, its reappearance on the bottle of magebane.

"It could be nothing, just a coincidence," she ends, lamely, only for Anders to snort.

"Oh, like Mother Petrice was _nothing_?" He snorts again, and turns his back on Hawke to glare toward the foyer. "Like everything else in this city is a coincidence?"

"Now now, mind your manners, Blondie," Varric breaks in calmly. "Sooner or later, someone'll say that, and be right."

"Not about this!" Anders explodes. "They targeted Hawke, the most visible apostate in Kirkwall — Maker, in the _Free Marches_!"

"Yet you talk about her as if she were not here," Fenris murmurs.

"Anders' point aside," Hawke interrupts, as Anders gathers himself for another shout. "Right now, I'm more concerned with _who_ , then _why_. We find who did this —" She waves at the foyer, her face, and pushes ahead before Anders can interrupt. "— and their reasons will follow."

As speeches go, she's made better ones, but she's trying to convince herself along with everyone else. She doesn't need heroics, just the simple reassurance of answers.

Varric peels off his gloves and slaps them against his palm. "Sounds to me like we should start in Darktown," he says. "That's the first place you saw this graffiti, right?"

"By Old Harlan's stall." Hawke resolutely ignores the eager flare in her chest; whatever's planned next, she won't be a part of it. The most she can do is share what she knows, pitiful as that is. "On our way back from the Wounded Coast."

Isabela groans, and lets her mug drop to the floor. "I hope you're not suggesting a trip through Darktown _tonight_."

"What better time to go, Rivaini? Sure, it'll be a bit wet and cold —"

"A _bit_?"

"— but the Coterie's all down at the docks. We'll take a walk, visit Tomwise, ask a few polite questions." Varric spreads his hands, palms-up. "Easy as pie."

"Right. Now that you've got us good and jinxed, count me in." Isabela lets her head loll against the back of the chair. "With all this rain, half of Darktown's flooded by now."

"All the more reason for you to come along. You can float us home, come to that," Varric says silkily. Hawke hides her half-smile behind her hand, and senses Fenris' own fleeting grin.

Isabela groans again. "Oh, all right. I could do with a visit to Darktown. I'm running out of pitch." She opens one eye to peer at Fenris. "What about you? Fancy a little getaway? Getting answers might be easier if we have you looming over our shoulders while we ask."

The hand on Hawke's back tightens slightly, even as Fenris easily replies. "I do not _loom_."

"Just like you don't brood, or glower, we get it." Varric cocks an eyebrow. "Still, Rivaini's got a point. Maybe your unique charm will smooth the waters — pun intended," he adds, smirking at Isabela.

As badly as Hawke wants to cling to Fenris, the way ivy clings to a wall, she isn't quite so selfish as to ask him to stay. A week is long enough for many things: a vigil born of love, for tears, for cowering in her room like a frightened child. Her legs may still tremble, her face may still ache — but she will not weep again, and she will not scream.

His hand slides up toward her shoulder blades. Hawke reads the silent question in the press of his fingers: _Will you be all right?_

She runs her hand along his arm, and squeezes. _Yes_.

* * *

A trip to Darktown takes the better part of a day even when the sun is shining; Varric estimates that half the usual entrances — kept in indifferent repair at the best of times — will be unusable after so much rain, and aims to enter near the Alienage.

"Two birds," he tells Hawke, as he straps Bianca into her leather cover. "We'll check on Daisy, then start poking around."

The thought that she had barely given Merrill a thought for the last week stings, a fresh counterpoint to the steady throb in Hawke's cheek. "A good plan," she says. "Give her my love. Oh, Varric —" She turns to her writing desk, scrabbling for a bit of paper and a quill. "This is what you're looking for."

Artist or not, she manages a fair likeness of the symbol, and blows on the ink to dry it before handing the scrap over to Varric. "Old Harlan's stall," she says, trying to ignore the uncomfortable knotting in her belly. For all that this little fact-finding mission is for her, she's quite superfluous to the whole thing.

"Old Harlan's stall," Varric echoes. He tucks the paper into his jacket, and gives her a cocky grin. "There and back, Hawke. You'll barely miss us."

 _Unlikely_ , Hawke does not say. She feels an insistent tug beneath her ribs, drawing her toward the door along with Isabela and Varric, but she keeps her feet rooted, and does not let her legs shake.

Fenris pauses at her side, his arm brushing hers as he clasps his cloak shut. She huddles close as a chill wind from the open door shivers through the foyer.

"Be safe," she murmurs, then presses a light kiss to the edge of his jaw. It hurts, as she expected it would, but it would hurt more to let him leave without one. _Sentimental idiot_ , she tells herself, but Fenris' pleased half-smile is reward enough.

"I will not be gone long," he promises, and kisses her mouth, light and swift. Hawke is more than happy to risk a second kiss — sore mouth be damned, a bloody _week_ is far too long — but he draws up his hood, and moves away with quick, silent steps. A moment later, he's out the door; a moment after that, the rain's obscured his form completely.

Anders shuts the door, his feathers trembling in a last gust of cold air, then sighs.

"So," he says. "What now?"

Hawke rubs her hands against her dress, not looking at the greasy patch of carpet on the other side of the foyer. The packages around her loom, unwanted and unwelcome — but she realizes, with a bright surge of satisfaction, that she can do something about that, at least. She could use the distraction; without Fenris, without Varric and Isabela, there's far too little between her and the insistent prod of memory. Perhaps the task might even keep Anders from talking about his newest conspiracy.

And somewhere, buried in the piles of fabric and food, there may be a hint, something that takes her closer to the _who_.

"Let's see who felt generous, shall we?" she says.

Sorting through the gifts keeps Hawke and Anders up well past midnight, with a few bits of healing breaking up the long task. Orana brings them more tea, and creamy cheese soup, and bread soaked in milk — barely better than an invalid's food, but Hawke is too grateful for something besides chicken broth to complain. Suddenly ravenous, she eats everything on her tray, only stopping when Anders warns her against stressing her stomach.

"You've been on a liquid diet for a week," he says, without looking up from a Tevene copy of the Chant. His fingers trace the stark, unfamiliar words as Hawke watches. "Easy does it, or you'll end up wasting all of Orana's hard work."

"It's no trouble to make more," Orana says, setting down a fresh pot of tea. "It's good to see you up, Mistress," she adds, with a shy smile at Hawke.

"It's good to be up," Hawke replies. "I missed your cooking, Orana. Broth doesn't hold a candle to it."

The girl pinks, and Hawke can't help a smile herself. "Thank you," she murmurs, then tiptoes away, bearing a stack of empty bowls to the kitchen.

"Do you try to make everyone love you, or does it just happen?" Anders asks, still thumbing through the Chant.

Hawke cuts him a glance as she cracks the seal on a letter from the de Launcets. His face is turned away, but she didn't mistake the fine edge in his voice. "I try to be kind," she says, lightly. "That's all."

He hums, a sound that could mean anything, and that leaves the hairs on the back of Hawke's neck raised and prickling. "Of course that's all," he says.

She begins to unroll the letter, then sighs. "Out with it. You've got something to say, I can just tell."

"How do you figure?" Anders closes the Chant, but doesn't set it aside. Instead, he holds it between them, like a shield. His eyes meet hers, blank and calm.

"You're playing coy," Hawke replies. "You only do that when you want someone to draw you out. Consider yourself drawn. What is it?"

"It's not just generosity, you know," he says. "All of this. Do you really not see why so many people reacted this way? What it means?"

"It means far too many people are busy minding my business, instead of their bloody own," Hawke says. She wants to pinch the bridge of her nose, and the fact that she can't sends her annoyance straight to the dark end of the scale. "Just come out and say what you mean, Anders. It's late and I really don't have the patience —"

"You're the _Champion_." Anders shoves the Chant aside to brace his hands on his thighs, then leans forward, eyes reflecting the blue light of his flames back to Hawke. "Over and over, you've saved this whole city, you've helped whoever's asked —"

"For a price," Hawke interrupts. "I'm no saint, don't make me out to be one."

"Not always." He's almost whispering, watching her with bright, unyielding eyes. "Feynriel. What could he pay? That poor bastard, the Saarebas? What about the miners at the Bone Pit, or half of Lowtown? If there's a cry in the dark in this city, people know you'll hear it."

He draws a deep breath, and Hawke recoils instinctively, holding her ribs as she moves. The man sitting across from her is almost a stranger, an ancient light moving under his skin, and she wants nothing to do with what he's saying. Nothing at all.

" _Mages_ know you'll hear them," Anders says. "That's loyalty you can't buy, Hawke. All this —" He waves his hand at the packages they've yet to open. "It's a sign. It's a _promise_. People saw what was done to you, and they spoke out the only way they can against —"

"If you say Meredith, I'm throwing you out," Hawke snaps, pulse pounding at the back of her throat. What Anders is saying frightens her; she likes wealth, and she likes popularity. She has no interest in power beyond what she carries within her.

 _But._

Buried beneath that fear is _interest_ , a part of her that thrills to the idea. Being admired is one of her life's chief pleasures, and she's never pretended otherwise, but to be _followed_? To have her voice heard above all others?

Her heart leaps against her hand. _They're just things_ , she tells herself, looking around the room. _Just ale and cheeses and pretty baubles. Bits of gratitude, nothing more._

Are they?

The de Launcets' letter is still in her hand. She saved their son — if not from a life trapped in the Gallows, then from being made Tranquil, or murdered outright.

She spoke, and Meredith listened.

Now the packages scattered around her shine in a very different light. Are they all simply gifts, sent by a grateful city to their favored Champion, or are they promises-in-waiting, ready to be forged into something —

"No." Before Anders can open his mouth, Hawke pushes clumsily to her feet. Her head swims as she stands, her vision in her right eye greying over until she catches her balance. "If you're saying what I think you are, Anders, you're mad."

"I'm not." Anders clenches his hands into fists, and beats them once against his thighs. "This city knows what that attack meant. They're telling you —"

"This is not some call to arms!" A muscle in Hawke's cheek twitches, hard enough to make her eye water, but she brushes the tear away impatiently and keeps glaring at Anders. "Kirkwall is not waiting for me to lead them against Meredith — Maker, how many of them do you really think would follow a _Fereldan_ , let alone a _mage_?"

"Enough would." The hectic light of the true fanatic fills his eyes, turning his smile from a plea to a grotesque sliver of teeth. "You know Meredith's mad. I've watched you stand up to her, again and again. So has the city. They'll listen to you, if you choose to speak. All of this, it's just proof of that. It's a beginning. If you would just —"

"Shut up," Hawke says, through her teeth. "This is insane. I told you, I'm not interested in starting a fight that will tear this city apart. And what happened to being worried about what Meredith could do to me? What do you think will happen if I stand in front of the Gallows and — and —" Her voice fails. The dull ache in her cheek and jaw grows fangs, and sinks them into her muscles. "What do you think will happen to Merrill? Or to you?" she says, when she can speak again. "There's no room for error here." _Not if I want to keep you all alive._

"So you'll compromise?" Anders stands, hands still knotted into fists. "You'll sit by and let Meredith treat the city like her own personal kingdom? You know what her templars do to the mages in the Gallows. What does our safety matter, compared to that?"

"I can't speak for you, but I'd like to stay alive."

"Safe in your house," Anders says around a sneer, cruel enough to make Hawke take a step back. The light is gone, snuffed out by a dark, towering disgust. "Far from the Gallows. You could be so much _more_."

She swallows, breathes carefully through her nose. Her knees have turned to rubber, and her stomach is full of thorns. The bloody thing is, he isn't wrong. She _is_ safe, she _is_ secure, and those are luxuries no other mage in Kirkwall will ever know, least of all the one standing before her. "I'm sorry, Anders," she says. "I am not what you want me to be. I never have been."

He gives her a stark, flayed look, two hot patches of red flaring in his cheeks, and then he seems to collapse in on himself. "Of course you're not," he says, almost too quietly to hear. "Excuse me. I need…I need some sleep. I'll come back in a few hours for healing."

"Anders," Hawke says, catching at his arm. "Don't walk away. I'm sorry."

"Excuse me," he says again, sliding from her grip. "Get some rest, Hawke."

Chasing Anders would only prolong the argument till one of them said something truly regrettable. Despite that, Hawke takes two steps after him before she stops, and lets Anders disappear upstairs alone. Then she sighs, cradling her sore cheek, and sinks down to the floor.

"Oh, Maker," she whispers, and doesn't move for a long time.

When she at last looks up, the candles have all gone out. Anders took his gentle blue flame with him when he left, and the foyer is shrouded in murky gloom, shot through with faint threads of moonlight.

The rain has stopped.

Hawke stands, grimacing when her knees pop, stumbling when one of her feet comes over all pins and needles, and begins to make her way toward the parlor. If she's going to lie awake regretting her choices, she should do so in bed, where she can at least be warm.

She makes it two steps before she gasps and shrinks away from a chill wetness under her foot. At first, she thinks she's walked through a few missed drops of magebane — a lovely thought — but the liquid is too cold, too fresh, to be the potion. Her next breath tells her all she needs to know: sea water covers the floor of her foyer, and the bitter-salt smell of its rot fills her nose.

Without thinking, Hawke turns, and walks toward her front door, shivering as she passes through the frigid water. If the sea's returned, then she'll bear witness. What else can she do, in this hushed and dreaming place?

This time, she tells herself, she won't run away when the waves come. She'll stay, and _see._

Her hands upon the lock, only for a heavy fist to pound against the door the moment she starts to open it.

Hawke flinches away, shocked awake when she bangs her ankle against a heavy trunk. The knock sounds again, vibrating the wood beneath her hand. Is that armor she just barely hears, on the other side?

Fenris and the others would simply slip inside. No one else comes to her door so late. No one with good news, that is.

Through the first sour burst of adrenaline, Hawke smooths her hair from her cheeks, and clears her throat. "Who is it?" she calls.

"Templar business," comes the rain- and door-muffled reply. "Open up!"

 _That didn't take long_ , Hawke thinks bleakly.

* * *

Apologies for the delay in posting! I've been traveling a bit, and haven't had time to really settle in and revise.

Thank you for reading, as always!


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N:** As always, thank you for reading, and for your patience.

* * *

Hawke draws a shaking hand over her face. "I know this is a terrible place to leave things," she says. "But is there any more brandy left?"

The bottle is half-full, of which Hawke is no doubt aware. Orsino makes a show of holding it up regardless. "A swallow or two left, I think." His jest earns a wan smile that vanishes between one breath and the next.

"You don't mind, then?" Hawke reaches for the bottle as soon as Orsino nods, and downs a third of what remains. She sputters, coughs into the crook of her arm, and rests the bottle in her lap — though not, Orsino notes, before she gives it a thoughtful look, as if debating another drink.

"When was the last time you ate, Champion? Or slept?" he asks.

Hawke laughs as she thumbs a drop from her lips. She rubs her hands against her cloak, then stops and clasps her hands in her lap when she sees Orsino watching. "If you're worried I'll fall senseless on your floor and leave you to explain to the templars, there's no need," she says, with a toss of her head. "I'm a Fereldan, who's spent the better part of a decade drinking with a pirate and a prince of the Merchant's Guild. I can hold my spirits."

"I don't doubt it," Orsino says, with perfect honesty. "But you haven't answered my questions."

"Ah." Hawke smiles, a flicker of her usual brilliance brightening her face. "And there's why they made you First Enchanter."

He returns the smile, and leans back in his chair. "I was the only one who _wanted_ to be First Enchanter, Champion."

"There's that, but you care. You actually _care_." She says it with a note of wonder, eyes clear and measuring as they meet his. "What a dangerous thing."

 _I could say the same,_ Orsino does not say. Hawke's presence here says it loudly enough.

"So tell me," he says instead. "Was this conversation with your visitor as fraught as usual?"

Hawke blinks, her mouth opening in a tiny _o_ of surprise. Orsino smiles again; there are few in the city who can claim they left the Champion speechless, and these days, his pleasures are sparse, flimsy things. That brief silence is something he can savor.

"You sly thing," she says, once she recovers herself. "You know who it is."

"The fascinating thing about all templars is they're all alike in one way." Orsino holds up his first finger. "Sooner or later, they all forget mages are people. Quite interesting, what they say then. I've known about your visitor for some time, Champion. And your other meetings. You've spent a great deal of time at the Chantry lately."

"How much of this story did you know when I walked in?" Hawke asks, with a new smile of her own. The same charming curve as the last, but the firelight no longer gleams in her eyes.

Malcolm Hawke's daughter, the first child of the man who walked free of the Gallows.

 _Maker help us all_ , Orsino thinks. "Only what I've overheard," he says. "Not what was said, nor what you planned —"

"There was no _plan_ ," Hawke snarls, bristling like a cat and showing as many teeth. "Whatever Meredith has said, I have no plan, no ulterior motives beyond saving —" She inhales, ragged, and three of the candles to Orsino's right are snuffed out.

"Champion," he warns, half-rising.

Hawke rolls her eyes ceiling-ward. "Really, First Enchanter, have a better opinion of my control than that." She clicks her fingers, and the candles reignite. "I simply can't help myself," she goes on, with another cold smile. "It's like being forced to eat nothing but bread for six months, and then being allowed back into the feast. Can you blame me?"

Orsino can, quite easily, but a part of him yearns for the ease in her voice. How strange, meeting a mage who doesn't see her powers as a curse. Had Malcolm taught her that? A speculation for another time. He settles into his seat, and gestures for Hawke to continue.

"As I was saying." Hawke uncorks the bottle, though she doesn't drink. "I had no plan — I _still_ don't have a plan, past saving someone I love." Her eyelids flicker, but her eyes are dry and hard when she looks up. "The one person I haven't failed."

Orsino's frustration mixes with sour amusement; for all her urgency, Hawke is slow to unveil the reason behind her visit. Impatience nearly drives him to demand a simple answer — but Hawke's story is as much as a confession as a statement of fact. She has to unburden herself first.

 _I'm not the Chantry_. _What gives you the right to ask any of this of me_?

The mercenary sliver in his soul whispers back: _She needs your help, Orsino, and someday soon, you'll need hers. Save this coin. The hour grows late._

The wind gusts into his window with a rain-soaked, dull roar.

* * *

 ** _Five weeks earlier._ **

Hawke slaps a hand over her mouth to catch a near-hysterical laugh before it can escape. Meredith's templars have no discernible sense of humor, and laughing at one who's come calling in the middle of the night seems like an excellent way to get herself hauled to the Gallows.

 _Look on the bright side. You're not really a mage anymore, are you? So there's no reason to clap you in irons and drag you through the streets_.

As if Meredith would need a reason.

"It's rather late," she calls. When in doubt, start babbling and hope they're too confused to press the issue. "Can't this wait till morning? I'm not really dressed for company, and surely your barracks are warmer than —"

"Open the damn door!" the templar bellows.

Hawke flinches, then draws up her spine. "Fine," she says, with a look over her shoulder in case Anders has come to investigate the noise. The last things she needs are an angry apostate and an annoyed templar in her foyer.

But there can't be much danger on the other side of the threshold, can there? Not when Nettle hasn't even bothered to rouse herself.

She throws the door open, and sees the black water churning in the square beyond her steps. It surges eagerly toward her feet, rain-lashed and hungry.

"Oh, Maker," Hawke breathes, her mouth heavy with the taste of salt. One of the smaller waves laps at her feet, spills into the dark foyer behind her. The freezing rain burns wherever it touches her bare skin.

And there, rising from the waves, are two silver statues, dimmed to grey by the blackness surrounding them. Their march up her steps sends another wave to drench her from the ankles down. Hawke's neck aches from leaning back to watch them loom over her.

"Serah Hawke," the first statue grates, its words like stones gritting underfoot. "Please go inside, you're freezing."

Hawke dodges the statue's hand as it reaches for her, biting her cheek when her own clumsiness strains her ribs. She no longer feels the icy bite of the rain, but she _is_ shivering, hard enough to make her teeth chatter. "Get away," she hisses. "Leave my home."

The second statue makes a heavy, put-upon noise, and casually rips its featureless head from its shoulders.

All around her, the world snaps its moorings, and lurches sideways. The water in the square blurs behind the statues, and she nearly retches as her balance disappears.

"Bloody hell," says the headless statue. "You're in bad shape." Its voice comes from high above her, not from the stone-still head in its arms. "Should I get — sister, look at me."

The world heaves into focus, and Hawke finds Carver frowning down at her, one hand extended, ready to steady her if she wavers again. Another templar, still helmeted, watches over his shoulder. "Carver?" she whispers, blinking like an owl at him, then at the square through the open door. The empty square, bare of everything but puddles. "Oh, _shit_ , it's you, isn't it? Shit."

"Yes," he says, still frowning. He takes her arm gently and steers her toward the parlor. The other templar kicks the door shut as they follow. "Carver. Your _brother_. Really, sister, what did you expect?"

Hawke pulls her arm from Carver's grasp, and slaps his breastplate, hard enough to make her palm sting. "Andraste's saggy _tits_ ," she says. ". I don't expect templars to come pounding on my door in the middle of the night, even if they do turn out to be my brother."

 _Not to mention the ocean in the damn square, but let's stick to the templar bit_ , she thinks, and chokes down another spray of laughter. _Oh, Maker, of course Nettle wouldn't get out of bed for_ Carver _._

"You do look like you're ready to jump out of your skin," Carver says, the crease in his forehead knife-sharp.

"Well, considering I thought there were _templars at my door_ ," Hawke replies, her voice shaking with adrenaline and the effort of keeping the laugh down, "I'm not overly surprised by that. What were you thinking?"

Carver, to Hawke's surprise, doesn't argue. He scuffs his massive, booted feet on her carpet and gives her the same bullish, guilty look she remembers from when he was seven, and Mother told him not to jump from the hayloft anymore.

"I had to make it look convincing," he mutters, not quite looking her in the eye. "In case —"

"In case _what_?" Hawke's jaw twinges; she sucks a breath through her teeth and turns away, rubbing as gently as she can and huddling toward the half-dead fire. "Oh," she says, when the worst pain has passed. "I see. In case someone was watching. But Carver, honestly, how would looking like you're raiding my home have helped you?"

"Well," he says. "In that case, it wouldn't have been my idea. Keran here would have seen something, and we'd just be investigating."

"Keran?" Hawke says, vaguely aware that parroting everything that comes out of Carver's mouth doesn't actually help her understand a bit of it. Behind Carver, the other templar takes off his helmet, and gives her a familiar sheepish smile from under a damp sheaf of wheat-colored hair. "Right. That Keran. You're looking well."

He ducks his head, and mumbles something indistinct. Hawke turns her attention back to Carver. "I'm sorry, but how is that any better? You think Meredith would let that go — no, wait, don't bother explaining." She holds up a hand as Carver opens his mouth. "I don't think I'd understand it if you did, and I already have a beast of a headache."

Carver snorts, but subsides into quiet, with Keran hovering awkwardly behind him, looking anywhere but at the two of them.

"Why are you here?" Hawke asks. "There are easier ways to get a reply to your letter." When that doesn't get the hoped-for laugh, she forges ahead anyways. "Surely you're not risking getting caught just to make sure I'm…" She waves a hand toward her face, where the bruises are still visible, even in the low light.

Carver looks marvelously offended. "What, you didn't think I'd come?"

No, she didn't. Their lives are as far removed as if the Waking Sea lay between them, but under the fancy armor, he's yet the little brother who stuffed hay down her trousers and whined about Bethany taking the last gooseberry tart.

It's dangerous to think this way. He's her brother, the last of Malcolm and Leandra, same as her, but if the choice came down to her or his hard-earned pride, what would win?

He's here now. Perhaps that's all the answer she needs.

"I didn't think you'd take the chance with Meredith — being, you know, _herself_ ," Hawke replies. "I've been injured before, and it hasn't alarmed you." She regrets saying so immediately.

"A bit out of the ordinary, this," Carver says, darkly.

Now it's Hawke's turn to snort, though a warm spot glows in her chest. "Funny. That's almost what Fenris said." Her throat tightens at the thought — Fenris, who still hasn't come home, whose warmth should be joined with hers, and isn't.

"Was it now?" Carver smirks. "Good to know he's got the right idea. Where is he?"

 _Now's not the time to ask about your sovereigns_ , she thinks ungraciously, then gives herself a mental slap. "Out with Varric and Isabela," she says. "They had…a lead. You know." She waves at her face again, a bit dismayed, but not surprised, at how quickly it's become habit. The visual is so eloquent, after all.

"I see," Carver says. The Amell pliancy melts from his face, for a heartbeat, leaving room for an echo of their father's steel. No, not quite; the steel has always been there. Carver's simply learned to wield it.

 _Be wary of your brother,_ Fenris told her. _He understands himself now, and will be dangerous for it._

 _Can't I be proud of him, too?_

 _If you wish. But be wary, first._

"And the bastard who did this?" Carver's voice pulls her from the memory. The new, hard lines of his features remain, his eyes dark as chestnuts as he waits for her reply.

"Dead," she says, dismayed again when her voice shakes on the single syllable. "Fenris —"

"Good." Carver gives her a sharp nod. "Tell him thanks, from me."

Outside, the crier calls two in the morning. Keran casts a look back toward the door, and clears his throat. "I'm sorry to say it, but we must be going. Any longer, and they'll come looking for us. And if we're not at the Chantry when we said we would be —"

"The Chantry?" Hawke arches an eyebrow at Carver — one of the few expressions that doesn't pain her, so long as she uses only the left side of her face. "Have you gained a taste for piety now, brother?"

"Piety's about the only thing the knight-commander doesn't suspect," Carver says, and follows it with a noisy sigh. "We've come to enjoy the silence of the Chantry at night, as we go on our patrols."

Patrols, for templars. Hawke files that bit of information away for later. "I see," she says.

"Remember that, sister," Carver tells her, weighing on each word and holding her gaze without blinking. "In case it's useful." He covers her shoulder briefly with a cold, gauntleted hand.

Hawke reaches up, squeezes his fingers with her own. She should thank him for the gift of seeing him, hearing him — she misses Carver, in the silent spaces between her bones, even if she's never said so out loud. Now is as good a time as any to start.

"Be safe, sister," he says, before she can speak. "Kirkwall's an ugly place. It —"

"Carver," says Keran, and Carver swallows whatever he was going to say.

"Don't do anything stupider than usual," he says, patting her shoulder and stepping away. "And tell your elf —"

"Four sovereigns, yes, I will," Hawke says, blinking too fast and trying to smile. Her new teeth ache, sweet-sharp, so she gives up. "You be safe, too."

Carver doesn't bother to reply, only raises a hand in farewell. Then he and Keran replace their helmets, and turn toward her front door together.

A flash of white-capped waves flickers beyond them, then vanishes as the templars pace into the rain. Rich salt pricks her sinuses, but with her next breath, she smells nothing but damp ash, rain, and the lemon-scented oil Orana uses for cleaning.

A last curl of wind slips past Carver and Keran when they close the door; Hawke shivers as she pads through the foyer to turn the locks. Her soaked slippers cling to her feet and leave tiny watermarks on the cold stones underfoot.

That isn't right. A thin layer of moisture mists her bare skin and demure beads of rainwater gleam on her robe from when she opened the door, but the hem is sodden past her ankles, dove-grey wool turned black, and her slippers are a salt-stained ruin.

There is no water on the floor of the foyer. She draws a breath, and water laps at her feet, bitingly cold. Another breath, and the foyer is dry once more. The sea lies beyond her door, hungry, singing, and the city sleeps, close to drowning.

Hawke holds her breath at the center of two worlds. The sea's silent laughter is mocking, but not unkind. It's far worse: it's patient.

How deep the sea, and how old.

The water surges past while she tries to catch her breath, drowning the meek fire in the parlor, foaming at the stairs. Now to her hips, her waist, each fresh wave tugging her down while it crests and falls away. Another breath; Hawke's skull groans from the effort of holding two worlds within it, but she feels no terror. Oh, no, she's far beyond that now, and nearly beyond thought as well.

The one thing remaining, as so often happens, is pain. With the last shred of will left to her, Hawke raises her right hand, and digs her nails into the tender pink skin at her temple.

No one ever accused her of subtlety.

The pain's fierce enough to bring tears fresh and pricking to her eyes, but she digs her nails in again, until the world gives a final spasm and settles into dark, familiar shapes. The mouthless laughter beyond her door goes silent. She's alone, with her aching face and a foyer full of gifts she doesn't want.

"Hawke?"

Not so alone, it seems. Anders stands at the foot of the stairs, his blue flame bobbing cheerfully above his shoulder. Hawke's too far away to make out the fine details of his expression, but not too far away to miss how faint concern sharpens to alarm when he sees her face.

"I heard a noise. Are you all right?" He crosses to her with all speed, though his voice stays at a whisper. "What happened, your — what did you do to your face?"

Hawke drops her hand as quickly as she can, seized by the urge to hide it behind her back like a naughty child. "Oh, did I scratch myself?" she says, contriving innocence. "It feels a bit like that, now that you mention it."

Anders gives her a half-hurt, half-amused look. He's gotten ever so much better at knowing when she's lying, though he's never quite learned how to call her out for it. "I'm sure it does," he says, then tips up her face with a finger under her chin. "Hawke, you're bleeding."

"Well, I couldn't help that," she says, turning her head out of his reach, and wipes the blood drops away with her sleeve. Grateful she is for all his help, and grateful she'll always be, but the cold, disdainful Anders who stalked out of her foyer hours ago hasn't disappeared. Submerged he might be by her friend and by the healer, but he's not far from the surface.

 _Nor is he far from the edge_. Anders is, Hawke believes, the most profoundly lonely person she's ever met. A vast and horrible irony.

The thought makes her gentle. "Are you still angry at me?" She squeezes his hand, not fighting him when he tries to tug it away.

"I'm always angry." Anders pulls his hand from hers. "You've known that — you've known that as long as I've known that…that you, that we — oh, _hell_." In the blue light, he looks little better than a fresh corpse: skin translucent and dull, eyes huge over dark smudges.

"No, I'm not angry at you," he says. With a fair attempt at a smile, too. "You _are_ a good friend, Hawke. Don't doubt it. Now, are you going to let me look at that?"

Hawke waves Anders' hand away. "I'm fine, I just need to clean up a bit." She's unwilling to take any more, not when half the shadows on Anders' face are hers by rights. "I've taken horrible advantage of you. Besides," she adds, unthinking, "the others will be home soon. Better save your energy, just in case." The words leave her throat cold; planning for the worst is one thing, actually _alluding_ to the worst is quite another. Without Carver's visit to act as a buffer, the worry comes creeping back: where are they?

 _He's on his way_ , Hawke tells herself. _And I'll remind him about the sovereigns. All will be well_.

Anders rolls his eyes. "No doubt someone will come home with a few new holes for me to patch up," he says. "Probably your — Fenris."

"I don't know about that." Hawke chooses to ignore the slip, and rests against a trunk with a grateful sigh. The throbbing in her head overtakes all other pains for a moment. "Historically, he's the one making the holes in people."

"Right you are," Anders says. Then, he gives her a sharp, assessing look. "Who was it?" he asks, tracing his fingers in the air beside her gouged temple. "Who was here?"

Weariness and her aching head keep her from an immediate confession. This she'll keep quiet, till she's ready for another argument. "Only the rain," she says, as she slips around Anders. Her robe clings to her ankles one step, and slides over her skin in a dry rasp the next. "Let's get some sleep, shall we?"

Something rustles at her door. Hawke ignores it, and Anders doesn't seem to notice. All the same, Hawke lies awake for hours, listening in the dark.

When she sleeps, she dreams of Meredith prying open Carver's mouth, and Fenris', and pours seawater into their throats from a ewer that never empties. Hawke screams, but no sound comes out, only red ink and teeth. Meredith purrs like a cat as Carver and Fenris drown.

* * *

 _Child, the sea is old, and tired._

 _Make your offering while you can._

 _Wake now, and go._

* * *

Hawke knows she should burn with guilt for putting on her cloak and slipping out the front door as silently as she could. She should be choking with guilt, every breath she breathes should be sour, for repaying so much kindness with so little consideration.

Guilt doesn't even touch her. She hardly feels the cold through her cloak or the sullen ache in her ribs. The press of Nettle's nose against her hand is a faint and distant thing, drowned out by a relentless imperative to _go_.

The silent shout woke her from restless sleep that afternoon. _Go_ , came the command, but not _where_. So, with Anders in his room and Orana and the Feddics in the kitchen, Hawke tiptoed down the stairs, clicked her fingers for Nettle to follow, and began to walk. No destination, only movement.

For a few steps, merely being outside her house for the first time in a week was enough to silence the command. Its imperative returned in moments, implacable as a glacier.

It pushed her toward the Chantry, so toward the Chantry she went, dragging her feet from weariness and avoiding everyone's eyes.

Now she climbs the stairs, now she stands at the doors, and now she opens the door. The smell of incense reaches her nose, rich with sandalwood and lemon, and the voice goes quiet, apparently satisfied.

Nettle circles Hawke's legs, whining softly. Hawke shakes herself. At this time of day, no one will be inside — they're home eating, or strolling through the square — and all but the lowliest novices will be tucked up warm in their cloister. Whatever nameless purpose drove Hawke here is too opaque for her to make out.

Nothing keeps her here but the thought of returning to her silent house, to face Anders' inevitable disapproval and worry. She might as well enjoy her escape while she's out, and make use of the quiet in the Chantry to parse what drove her here in the first place. Her legs could use a few minutes' rest, besides.

She's always loved the Chantry, with its sweet smells, and musty old Revered Mothers reading from mustier books. There are worse places to look for silence. Hawke's breath comes easier with every step she takes toward the altar.

Nettle paces ahead of her, sniffing at every door as they pass. Whatever protests her friends may raise about her little sojourn, they can't argue she came unprotected. All but the stupidest or most desperate mercenaries think twice when they hear a mabari snarl.

No mercenaries are in evidence inside the Chantry hall. The only people in attendance are a red-haired novice, and two noblewomen Hawke recognizes by shape: one is reedy as the other is stout. One never sees these women apart, and one never hears Lady Ghent at all, thanks to Lady Aix's particular resonance.

That same resonance makes it impossible to escape the conversation, though Hawke manages to avoid being a direct participant. It helps that misery is excellent camouflage: no one wants to take on more than their share, and that makes her nicely invisible. She sinks into the last pew, legs trembling, and tries to find a position on the hard wooden bench that takes a little pressure off her ribs.

 _I'll be regretting that walk for the next few days_ , she thinks, absently rubbing her hands on her cloak. _And for what?_

"— won't wake up," says Lady Aix, in a voice that would give a wyvern pause. "Not even to pi — to eat or drink, not in almost a week. Tell me, what sort of malady causes _that_ , my girl?"

The novice makes some meek reply, which Lady Aix answers with a barking laugh that leaves Hawke cringing in her pew. Nettle huffs against her leg, and Hawke buries both hands in the mabari's bristly fur.

"I don't want you to _pray_ for her. Maker's balls, I want someone to _help_ her. Margery's all I have, she's all —" Lady Aix's voice cracks. The novice rushes to fill the vast stillness left behind with shapeless, comforting noises.

Hawke's stomach turns to ice. Lady Aix is known for three things in Kirkwall: she's louder than any ten people put together, she abhors Tevinter, and she worships her little daughter. If Margery is ill enough to drive her mother to silence…

Damn her legs and her battered face and the voices in her head; Hawke barely knows the woman, but she can't ignore the grief clouding Lady Aix's voice. She turns, ready to stand and offer the kind, useless words one does, when Lady Aix shouts, loud enough to rattle the candles in their holders.

"What good did your prayers do those poor sods on the docks, I ask? They're cut to ribbons and all you do is pray, pray, _pray._ My girl's dying and you'll just offer up some pretty words and then beg me for coin. She _won't wake up!_ "

The last four words burst through the Chantry like a winter squall. Hawke stares as Lady Ghent draws Lady Aix, now weeping, toward the door, while the novice stares after them with a face pale and waxy as cheese. As the door opens on the now ink-dark night without, Lady Ghent meets Hawke's gaze, and her dark eyes go wide in recognition.

The contact lasts only a moment. Lady Aix wails again and claps a hand over her mouth, then the door shuts behind them. The Chantry shudders into silence.

Hawke rests her shoulders on the back of her pew. The pain in her ribs is a dull, distant thing now, shoved to the back of her head by the last echoes of Lady Aix's cries.

"The poor sods on the docks," Hawke murmurs, stroking Nettle's head when the mabari whines.

She has no illusions about her intelligence. Fate saw fit to grant her enough charm and beauty to render intelligence redundant, and then doubly-blessed her with enough cleverness to understand her deficiency. Arithmetic, history, languages — they flow through her head like water through a sieve, and leave as much behind as they go.

But anyone can glimpse a pattern, if they look hard enough.

Kirkwall's bones are made in equal parts of stone and misery; its blood is despair, its air is grief. Violence is no more remarkable than the changing of the tides. And yet.

Bloody fights on the docks. A dream of the sea. Serpents etched on glass and painted on walls. A beating in the Hanged Man. A little girl who won't wake up. There's no progression, no logic, no tenuous whisper holding them together — but there, rippling at the edge of her vision, is the thread Hawke needs to connect them all. Out of reach, no matter how hard she tries to grasp it.

Something guided her here, to this pew, to that conversation, made her risk her friends' anger and her own safety, and for _what_? Bread needs yeast to rise, an arrow needs the bow to fly. What is she missing? What sets these griefs apart from those that came before, in this city known best for its chains?

"Why here?" Hawke whispers to Andraste's calm, expectant face. "What do I need to do?"

The statue, of course, has no reply. Hawke stays in her seat till the novice begins to fuss at the altar, casting sidelong looks over her shoulder as she prepares for the midnight devotions. Both Hawke's feet prickle as she rises, and she stumbles over Nettle's sleeping bulk. The mabari sighs, long-suffering, then follows Hawke to the door, pausing to yawn and shake herself.

Hawke takes her time opening the doors, hoping a final lightning revelation to be bestowed upon her. One tug on that elusive thread, and the entire pattern will come clear.

 _And I'll finally be useful again_. She steps into the night, shivering under her layers of wool and velvet, and feels the now-familiar worry clutch at her as soon as she goes down the steps. She may have missed whatever clue the mouthless voice wanted her to glean on this sojourn, but she did manage to forget, for a little while, that Fenris is still not home, and that her mana is still banished. Visiting the Chantry was good for that, at least.

The streets are nearly deserted. Kirkwall's varied assortment of thieves and mercenaries are huddled close to their fires tonight, and the few guardsmen Hawke passes barely glance her way. She watches the alleys and corners, in case anyone is too desperate for coin to stay inside, but either Kirkwall is experiencing a rare epidemic of good sense, or Nettle is enough of a deterrent.

Hawke rubs her hands against her cloak, then draws up short two steps before she passes from the Chantry foreyard to the square, stomach curdling. Another symbol's been painted on the high archway, the vivid red turned black in the night. It's fresh enough that Hawke can smell the ink through her healing nose. She's missed them by moments.

Whoever painted the symbol lavished a great deal of effort — and took a great deal of risk — on the small details. The serpents' teeth and scales gleam, and every link in the chain is rendered as an individual piece, visible even in the darkness.

The chain is broken. Links shattered, spread to the winds. The serpents are free, mouths grinning wide and sly, and oh, how their teeth shine.

Hawke's tongue clenches as the taste of iron floods her mouth. Not from fear, but from the rich, sweetish scent rising from the ink. Blood, painted in lavish strokes across the wall.

"Oh," she says bleakly, as the _who_ comes into focus. Her chest constricts, then flares in agony as her mana ignites for an instant. A reward, for all her good work, and for the work that's yet to come.


	6. Chapter 6

Previously: Hawke's templar visitor turns out to be a well-intentioned Carver, and a nameless impulse sends Hawke to the Chantry, where she thinks she's found a pattern behind Kirkwall's new series of disasters. Not only that, her mana has begun to return, and so has her sense of self.

Onward...

* * *

All magic has taste, has texture. Hawke's magic is a sweet golden blur, a summer wind and the sound of bees around the hive. This past week, she's mourned its absence, prodded at it as one would worry a bruise, all while feeding the reed-thin hope that the hollow ring carved around her heart would fill once more. Now, it feels like a sunburst inside her chest, pure and searing, driving the breath from her lungs, leaving her dizzy.

"Oh, thank the Maker," she whispers, so relieved her knees nearly buckle. Without thinking of what she's doing, or anything but the fragile light beneath her ribs, she presses a hand to the wall to steady herself.

A new magic shifts beneath her palm: hot sand spilling through her fingers, an iron tang, sinuous muscles coiling and flexing.

 _Blood magic_. _Right._ Hawke jerks her hand away, relief forgotten, but the clear, gilded border of her certainty remains.

It's so simple she nearly laughs. Of course blood magic would be the thread to tie together all these miseries. What else could be behind all Kirkwall's newest ills? She's seen enough blood magic over the years to know exactly what could be behind each incident — a pinprick on a child's arm as you pass in the market, a dockworker whipped to frenzy by a spell cast from a shadowed corner. The pattern laid clear in her mind's eye wavers, then reforms itself: a web, with blood magic in its dark, occluded center.

But she knows _who_. In general, if nothing else. But all else will follow, she's sure of that, and blood mages she can fight like any other enemy. They begin as men, after all.

 _Praise Andraste, I can be myself again_ , Hawke thinks, and lets out a helpless bubble of a laugh.

The urge to shout her revelation, mercifully brief, fills up her throat. Hawke steadies herself with a few breaths, basking in the pleasure of a pattern — no, a _puzzle_ — completed, though her satisfaction is even briefer than wanting to shout.

 _Blood magic. Well then._

There will always be blood mages in Kirkwall, as surely as the tides will wash rotted seaweed and salt onto the docks. Old Harlan's caramels will forever be uneatable, the Hanged Man will always reek, and everywhere one walks, there is blood beneath the stones.

The Veil is no thicker than the skin of a plum. Strong language could tear it most days, let alone blood magic. Hawke closes her hands into a fist. The stray spell-tendrils caught in her grip give under the pressure, like a handful of wheat.

 _Or raw meat_. Hawke's mouth is abruptly too full of saliva.

The Keep should be her next stop. Whether a new group of blood mages have set up shop in Kirkwall, or a few Circle mages have finally reached their breaking point, Aveline needs to know, preferably before Meredith hears of it. The guards may be powerless to stop a full templar hunt, should it come to that, but they can keep collateral damage to a minimum.

And there always is, with blood mages. Hawke swallows away the electric, sour taste, but a faint snarl in the spell's weave catches her attention before she can take her first step toward the Keep. No, not quite a snarl, far too smooth for that, but solid where the blood magic itself refuses to hold a consistent shape. For no reason, Hawke thinks of a pearl hidden beneath a measure of silk. When she touches it with the edge of her awareness, its responding shudder sends ripples through the entire spell. Her mana flares again, weaker than before, but when the light behind her eyes fades, the trickling flow in her chest is measurably brighter.

Hawke opens her hand, palm-up, and thinks of light.

A faint ball of cobalt and silver flame leaps into life two inches above her palm. Unsteady, barely larger than her thumbnail, it winks out in moments, but Hawke can't help a trembling grin. It's a beginning, sweet and clear as mountain water.

Her grin vanishes as quickly as the flame; blood magic doesn't give out of generosity. It's a fundamentally greedy magic, no matter how it's used — but that half-hidden pearl is another story. Hawke prods it gently again, and finds herself rewarded with another incremental brightening within her chest. For now, it merely serves to cast light on just how empty she is — compared to her usual flow of mana, this is barely dregs in the bottom of a wine cask — but oh, how sweet it feels.

Hawke would like nothing more than to be left alone to rejoice in her mana's return, but the spell ripples once more, the smooth mote at its center beckoning. Her awareness is drawn to it, like a cat's eye to a bird darting past a window, and under the fading shivers through the spell itself, the mote pulses with power barely leashed.

She smells blood again, and feels something like a heartbeat, throbbing at the center of the spell.

Sickened, she backs away, glancing all round to make sure the street is still hers alone. If this is blood magic, it's not a spell she recognizes — though that, she reminds herself, as she wipes her hands on her cloak, is a matter of pride.

 _Ignorance, however, is not_ , says a voice in her head, equal parts her father's, and Fenris'.

Who to ask, then, and with whom to share her joy? Anders is no more knowledgable than she is, and carries twice her prejudices. But there _is_ an expert, less than an hour's walk from where she stands now.

With one last glance back at the wall, where the serpents still laugh and twist and the spell still throbs below the mingled ink and blood, Hawke pulls her hood over her face and clicks her fingers. Nettle, roused from a pile of fishmonger castoffs, pads toward her. She leans against Hawke's leg, reeking of slimy bones, unconcerned by blood magic, and follows as Hawke hurries toward the Alienage.

* * *

Merrill welcomes Hawke with a smile and three prodigious sneezes.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she says, waving Hawke and Nettle inside as she mops at her face with a scrap of linen. "I haven't been to see you at all, and I know I should have, but I'm —" Another sneeze, another flurry of mopping under her nose as she kicks the door closed. "Well, you see. Must be going around the Alienage. If you listen hard enough, you can hear all the _achoos_ from here to the Hanged Man."

Hawke listens as she shrugs off her cloak, but all she hears is the wind whistling through the cracks in Merrill's roof. There's a sizable fire crackling, though, with a half-cooked pot of beef and barley stew hanging over it — courtesy, no doubt, of Varric, who can't quite shake the habit of looking after Merrill. A vague guilt over not having done the same passes through Hawke, but Merrill herds her into a seat at the table before she can apologize.

"It's lovely to see you, Hawke," says Merrill, through the linen. "But isn't it a bit — it's night — are you alone?"

 _Oh, Merrill,_ Hawke thinks. "I brought Nettle," she says, nodding toward the mabari stretched out, blissful and belly-up, in front of Merrill's fire. "No one was going to bother me, no matter how late it was."

Merrill nods, doing a poor job of looking convinced. Hawke resists the urge to sigh; no one who isn't Fereldan-born will ever have enough faith in mabaris. "Well, of course," she says, tucking the linen in her pocket and clearing a few towers of books to the side. Hawke smiles when she catches sight of the newest _Swords and Shields_ , and then hides her wince as her jaw twinges.

"But how are you feeling?" Merrill leans across the table, all sweet, red-nosed concern. "You look ever so much better than the last time I saw you, but that was right after you — oh, nevermind."

"Right after I got the shit kicked out of me, yes," Hawke says, guilt pressing close once more. She hadn't asked about Merrill once this past week; she'd barely thought of Merrill at all, and the while time Merrill was trapped in a drafty house, muddling her way through a nasty cold. "Anders has done wonders," she adds — if she can't take back her negligence, she can at least give credit where it's massively due. "And Varric and Isabela have been guarding my door."

"And Fenris?" Merrill asks, with a sly gleam lighting her eyes. "He's been guarding…your person?"

Mingled worry and longing cut off Hawke's reply for a few seconds. "Very clever," she says, at last, as she tries not to let any worst-case scenarios into her head. "But as much as Varric — and _you_ , apparently — want to think so, I've spent most of the past week in bed, and not in any enjoyable way."

"Well, there will be time for that," says Merrill, with an incongruously sage nod. "What did they find, on their little trip? They stopped by here, and I would have gone, but Varric took one look and told me to get into bed. Silly dwarf," she finishes, a fond smile lifting her mouth as she traces a crack in her table. "I could have helped, but he insisted, and so did 'Bela."

"And right they were," Hawke says, reaching out to press Merrill's hand between hers. "You should be in bed now. I'm sorry for bothering you, and for not checking in sooner."

"Oh, Hawke." Merrill's cheeks pink, as they always do. She squeezes back. "It's all right. You've had other things to worry about."

"I've spent far too much time feeling sorry for myself," Hawke says. _Along with having screaming fits, and fighting with Anders_. _Maker, it's like I'm a teenager all over again._ "I could have spared a few moments to feel sorry for you."

That gets another smile out of Merrill, and after another round of sneezes, followed by a dank, rattling cough that sets Hawke's teeth on edge, Merrill gives Hawke a measuring look across the table.

"Are you all right, though?" she asks. "What happened — it was awful, Hawke, seeing that — but that makes it sound like it's about me, and it's really not, is it? Are you all right?"

Hawke considers; she tries not to lie to Merrill in general, not only because of the puppy eyes but because Merrill always seems to know, but any truthful answer will sound like a plea for sympathy. She didn't come here to be coddled, she came to ask for help — and while that's off the table with Merrill being sick, she's not going to give in now.

"I will be," she says, which is the best answer, if not the most precise. Merrill gives her a swift, sidelong look that says she knows what Hawke's avoiding, but she doesn't press.

"So then," Merrill says. "Why did you come, Hawke?"

"I can't just stop by to see my friends?"

"Oh, you can, but that's not all it is, is it?" Merrill taps one finger on the table. "You've got a reason, all bottled up in your head. What is it?"

Merrill may seem as wispy as the clouds on Sundermount, but the core of her is solid iron. It has to be, but even after seven years, that sudden solidity still startles Hawke. Another reason not to lie to Merrill, however sweet she is.

"Have you seen the serpents, the ones painted all over Hightown?" she asks. As soon as she asks the question, she feels again the sudden weight of the pearl, and the power leaping beneath its surface. A memory, nothing more, but her hands knot tight in her lap.

Merrill nods, eyebrows puckering. "Well, not in Hightown, but in Darktown, near Old Harlan's stall, and then by Anders' clinic — I've been checking on his cats, making sure no one's been messing about with it — and there's one in Lowtown, too. I told Varric, when they were here."

 _By Anders' clinic_? Hawke's knuckles ache. "There's a new one," she says. "It's…a bit different."

 _Just say it, Hawke. "There's a new one, and I felt blood magic when I got close, and also this little pearly bit of something that started waking up my mana. Anything in your books about that?_ "

The golden certainty that carried her on soundless feet from Hightown to the Alienage begins to crack; Hawke knows she's guilty of saying a thousand mad things in the past year alone, but oh, Maker, why did one of them have to be this? Why is she faltering now?

Why, indeed. What has she not considered?

But Merrill's still nodding, curiosity burning off the sleepy haze in her eyes, and Hawke pushes forward. Even if it sounds as daft out loud as it does in her head, Merrill's the one person she can trust to not laugh.

She still hedges.

"I may be wrong, but I felt blood magic — no, not just that, I _smelled_ blood, mixed in with the ink, but there was more to the spell. It wasn't just there, it was…powered, by something, behind the spell, like a — Merrill, what is it?"

Her friend doesn't turn back when she pads into her bedroom. "Where was it?" Merrill calls, over the rustle of heavy clothes.

"Halfway between my house and the Chantry — oh, Merrill, no, I didn't mean for you to come see it —"

"Whyever not?" Merrill's bright eyes peer at Hawke, sharp as a bluejay's, from under the shadow of her hood. She tucks her staff, and a small stack of linen scraps, under her cloak. "I'd like to see it, Hawke, and the rain's stopping, so we can walk back together and take a look. Won't be much use if I can't feel it myself."

Which is as irrefutable a point as one can make, but Hawke's stomach still knots tight as her fingers at the thought of making Merrill crawl through the cold, damp city. "It may not be raining now," she says, unsure of why, besides guilt, she's so reluctant to take Merrill back with her. "But later —"

"Hawke," says Merrill. "Let's go."

 _She would have been a formidable Keeper,_ Hawke thinks to herself as she rises. Arguing with Merrill is like taking milk from a kitten and disappointing your favorite grandmother, with a side of dancing on knife-points. She keeps her thoughts about Merrill's Keeper-voice to herself, and rouses Nettle as Merrill extinguishes the candles and fire. Hawke watches, with her envy considerably less toothless than the day before as Merrill sets a cantrip on her pot of stew, then winces as Merrill sneezes and quietly groans behind her.

"I'm _fine_ , Hawke, and a little fresh air may be good for me," she says at the door.

"You'll have to look outside Kirkwall for that," Hawke reminds her.

* * *

A clammy but clear night greets them; while Hawke was inside Merrill's house, a brisk wind blew most of the clouds away, and though a few still scud past, a fair portion of stars are visible.

Halfway through a pleasant ramble on constellations, Merrill breaks into a fit of coughing that doubles her over. Hawke pounds her on the back and holds her arm till she stands up, eyes streaming, and spits to the side.

"This is miserable," she says, wiping her mouth.

"These spring colds always are." Hawke glances ahead — still another mile to walk before they're in sight of the graffiti. "Merrill, let's get you home."

"Don't be silly, we're almost there. And this sounds _interesting_ , I'm not going to miss it for a bit of coughing."

 _At least I can get her in front of the fire at home_ , Hawke thinks. Not only that, but she doesn't need mana to mix up a poultice or two to help Merrill clear her lungs.

Pleased she can pay Merrill back for the trouble, Hawke links her arm through Merrill's and keeps walking. Nettle bounds ahead of them, never quite out of sight, sniffing all the barrels and boxes littering the alleys. The sound of her claws on the street are the loudest noise around them, apart from Merrill's occasional muffled coughs and sneezes. Scrubbed clean by the frequent rains, its streets lit only by moonlight and sparse streetlamps, Kirkwall is almost lovely.

Almost. When she squints, Hawke can just make out the graffiti at the far end of the street.

"Hawke."

"Mmm?" Hawke glances at Merrill. "What is it?"

Merrill's eyes flash under her hood, bright as fireflies. "What is what?"

"You said —" Hawke watches Merrill's guileless, curious face, then shrugs. "I thought you said something."

" _Hawke._ "

The voice is practically at her ear, a dry, glassy rasp. Hawke flinches from it, and she's too close to Merrill to hide it.

"Is everything all right?" Merrill asks The curiosity is concern now, more than Hawke can banish with a smile and a joke.

She tries anyways. "Oh, just making it all about me, as usual. Don't worry about it."

Merrill's clearly unconvinced, but another sneeze distracts her long enough for Hawke to hurry her into full view of the graffiti.

"Oh, is that it?" Merrill asks, rhetorically. She picks up her steps, dragging Hawke along with her. "The chains — they're broken, they weren't like that on the others, and —"

"Hawke Hawke Hawke Hawke Hawke Hawke Hawke." It's the caw of a crow, or fingernails scraping on driftwood. Hawke's ribs send up a fresh wave of aches, till she's nearly breathless. "Hawke," says the voice again, from right behind her. "Hawke. Haaaaaaaaa —"

She knows there'll be nothing behind her if she turns. Nothing is stretching cold fingers toward her hood, nothing is breathing in her ear. There is nothing and no one calling her name.

And yet, while Merrill's attention is on the graffiti, and Nettle is back to nosing at the fish barrel, Hawke looks over her shoulder, every inch of her skin prickling and her stomach turned to ice.

The sea foams at her feet, knee-high and rising. It surges around her, swirling between her legs in delighted, chilly waves. All around her is the smell of rot, of salt, and from beneath her feet comes the pull of the undertow.

"Hawke Hawke _Hawke_ —"

"Hawke?" calls Merrill.

She whips around so quickly her sodden cloak nearly trips her. Her heart skids high and uneven in her chest, her mana matching it beat for beat. Between one blink and the next, her clothes are dry, and she smells only trash and cold air again.

Not quite. The sea's rot and salt lingers at the edge of the wind. Hawke imagines it blowing out to sea, fretting at the black surface of the water. It is patient, the sea; it can bide its time, before it sweeps her away.

"What is it?" Her palms are greasy; she wipes them on her cloak as she catches up with Merrill. "Do you feel it?"

Merrill moves her hand over the graffiti, an inch of air separating her skin from the ink. "I don't feel anything," she says, a frown bunching her vallaslin. "Not even echoes, Hawke. There's no magic here, let alone blood magic."

"What?" Hawke reaches out before Merrill can answer, the skin on her back tightening with gooseflesh. Cold radiates from the wall, the smell of ink leaves the air stained and sticky, but the stones beneath Hawke's palm are inert, no more alive than dry, ancient bone. "That can't be — I felt it, right here, barely two hours ago, it couldn't have just disappeared…"

"No, it couldn't," says Merrill.

Hawke glances up at Merrill's face, where a quiet flash of pity is just melting away. Abruptly, Hawke thinks of her missing mirrors, and the pity behind _that_ act of kindness, and stamps on the urge to keep speaking. _I felt it, I felt it right here, I did_. None of it will convince Merrill, and Hawke needs to avoid sounding like a child any more than she already has.

"So, I suppose telling Aveline about my little discovery is off the table," she says, with the best rueful smile she can manage. "Merrill, I'm sorry, I don't know how — I've brought you out in the cold for nothing." That, at least, sounds sincere.

Merrill's pity shifts to confusion, and a certain wry amusement. "Not for nothing, it's always nice to see a friend," she replies. "But Hawke, why did you think it was blood magic?"

 _Because I felt it moving under my hand like it was breathing, and because I've killed enough blood mages to recognize when it's right in front of me._ Hawke tilts her head, as if she wants a better look at the graffiti, and lets the long sweep of her fringe hide her eyes. "I'm not sure," she says, then pounces on the first remotely-true answer that comes to mind: "My mana's coming back, though — just a bit, but maybe enough so things are reading strangely? Oh Merrill, really, it's just a little bit."

But Merrill's enthusiasm is impossible to ignore, and resist. "That's wonderful news!" she says, clasping Hawke's hands in both of hers. "I mean, apart from you thinking there's blood magic out and about. You must have been so startled."

"That's one word for it." Hawke starts to draw Merrill away from the graffiti and toward her house, where there will be blankets and hot water and fresh soup for Merrill, and lockable doors that she can put between herself and her household for a few minutes while she _thinks_.

 _Surprise_ is one word, indeed, but a truer one is _certain._ It cut through all else like a knife — the lingering pain, the twin strands of uselessness and self-pity, her worry for her friends — and let her feel like herself once more: the Champion of Kirkwall, able to solve all problems with a spell or well-aimed word or a pint.

She's been out of the world for a mere week — has it been such a blow to her pride that she would _imagine_ blood magic, where now existed?

A week trapped in her room, useless and drifting and wallowing in her pain. That alone would drive a person to distraction; what would it do to a Champion, who's forgotten what it's like to be on the sidelines?

 _Maker, I should have known before I went running off to Merrill_ , she thinks, her throat burning with shame. _Nettle didn't so much as whine, did she? And if a mabari's not alarmed —_

The thought doesn't bear finishing. It's a damn good thing she went to Merrill first instead of Aveline — one pitying look from her oldest friend and she would have choked on all that bright certainty as it crumbled to ash.

 _Then what did I feel?_

That's simple enough: between the attack, and the magebane, and the semi-solitude, she's struggling to find its balance once more. Her mana is returning, clumsily, and she made a simple mistake. No harm done, beyond making Merrill walk through this abominable cold, but she can make that right.

Hawke straightens her shoulders. It's an admirable answer, one that encompasses the voice, and her mad glimpses of the sea. She will be herself again, and until then, she must be patient —

Her belly freezes again, a cold dread settling over her like a shroud: the first time she saw the sea was the night before she was attacked. No stretching of the truth will conceal that fact. She walks arm-in-arm with Merrill as if each step doesn't feel like she's dragging a lead weight behind her, and keeps her face hidden under her hood. Not to hide a flush, or shame, but to hide the wide, white horror she knows is blazing from her eyes.

Slowly, steadily, the mote of power begins to pulse at the base of her skull.

 _I'm going mad,_ she thinks, careful to keep pace with Merrill, forcing her face into calm, empty lines. It's her best, oldest trick, and not even her family, not even Fenris, could read her thoughts when she is finished.

"Look, Hawke!" Merrill points ahead with her free hand, then coughs into the crook of her elbow. A few hundred feet ahead, all the windows of Hawke's house blaze with warm, fragile light. "They must be home!"

The thought of Fenris waiting for her within makes it easy to forget her own mind can't be trusted — for a few moments, at least. Hawke tightens her grip on Merrill's arm, and together they cross the square at a run.

* * *

Varric's little masterpieces have convinced Kirkwall — and half of Thedas, it seems — that Hawke returns from all her adventures covered head-to-toe in blood, but in truth, there's very little blood involved these days. For herself and her friends, at least; those facing them usually release it in vast quantities. Hawke finds she reeks more from her walks home through Darktown than she does from any of the violence preceding it. Squabbles and grudges aside, she and her friends have fought together too long and too well to fear serious injury.

It comes as a shock when Hawke throws open the door of her house, and is greeted by a thick curl of blood-scented air. The wide-mouthed serpents flash past her mind's-eye, and once more her mana leaps, goaded by a burst of fear and a barely-felt pulse in the back of her head.

"What happened?" Hawke says, snapping one of the clasps of her cloak in her hurry to take it off. "Who's hurt? Anders? Orana?" At her feet, a few half-dried drops of blood glow dully at her. " _Anders_?"

"In the kitchen," comes Varric's voice. "We're all fine, Hawke, keep your hair on."

"Oh, well, he doesn't sound nervous," says Merrill. She slips out of her cloak far more gracefully than Hawke, and hangs it on her usual hook near the door. "Shall we go see?"

The world slips sideways, and fades to grey at the edges. How easily it happens now, no clumsy lurch between one world and another. Hawke doesn't trust herself to do more than nod in reply to Merrill's question; the smell of blood sinks deeper into her with every breath she takes, slides down her throat as she swallows. That faint beckoning pulse still throbs, low in the curve of her skull. The serpents dance, and the sea tugs at her feet, patient and slow. If she looks down, she won't see the path worn in her rug by dozens of feet, but churning, white-capped water. She feels it now, creeping up her legs, cold and clinging.

 _Do not let it show_ , she tells herself, and leads the way to the kitchen. The dark waters tug at her legs, until finally she sinks her nails into her thighs and the sea shreds away long enough for her bright parlor to assert itself. After that, she counts her steps, and doesn't blink, and feels the sea's weight, pressing against her from behind, waiting.

The smell of blood is thickest in the kitchen, though only a few bloody bandages litter the kitchen table. Hawke scans the scene with a single glance — Isabela and Varric on their usual stools, Anders fussing with something at the fire, Orana and Bodahn near the pantry — and fixes on Fenris, standing at the near end of the table, hands braced against the edge.

At least guilt makes it easy to ignore the weight at her back, and the throb in her skull, Hawke muses, as Fenris turns his head to meet her eyes. The hard line of his mouth loosens, his gaze loses its grim cast, but there's a quiet reproach behind his relief. Hawke digs her nails into her thighs again.

Mad she may be, but there's no doubt that she is, as she's often told, a total fool. One who does not deserve the exhausted, mud-spattered man who pushes away from the table, and comes to her side, all his unspoken reproach melting away into concern.

"Are you well?" he asks, and oh, Hawke hates herself. A _note_ , a single line scrawled on a page, that's all it would have taken —

— but she remembers, clear as day, that vital urgency, that drove her from her bed. She couldn't have paused, not for a moment, with that ringing through her and driving her onward.

"As well as I can be," she answers, flushing with a fresh shame. It's an evasion, but all her better answers — _I don't know, I'm imagining conspiracies, I'm losing my mind_ — are lies, or too truthful. The latter won't help, and she will never lie to Fenris.

He knows there's more, as he always does, but he doesn't press. Instead, he touches her cheek once, then turns his head away to cough into his elbow.

Isabela, with a bandaged leg propped on a stool, and both hands wrapped around a mug of ale, seems to have been the source of the blood, though she raises her mug cheerfully enough when Hawke looks her way. "Welcome home, sweet thing," she says. "And look, you've brought Kitten home with you."

"Hello, Isabela," Merrill says, edging past Hawke and dropping onto a stool at the table. "You've been busy."

Isabela blows a few strands of sweat-damp hair out of her eyes. "That's one word for it," she replies, then pushes her mug across the kitchen table to Merrill.

Anders snorts from his place by the fire, where he's stooped over a kettle with his back toward Hawke — a gesture that Hawke knows is entirely deliberate. "I can think of a few others." He tosses a handful of herbs into the kettle, and a sharp, clean smell — mint and elfroot and rosemary — fills the kitchen. Hawke's throat loosens as the smell of blood recedes, then tightens again as she sees how tightly Anders' hands are wrapped around the kettle's handle.

 _If the worst I get is a lecture from Anders, I'll have gotten off easily_ , she reminds herself.

"What happened?" she asks, to everyone and no one. "Are you all right?"

"We're fine," says Varric. He taps his own mug on the table, and rubs his eyes. "Had ourselves a bit of an adventure, but Rivaini here got the worst of it."

"Lucky me." Isabela takes her mug back from Merrill, and rolls her eyes when Hawke opens her mouth. "No apologies, Hawke, please, they're bad for my health."

Anders makes a short, furious noise, and Fenris' mouth hardens again.

 _Oh, Maker._ Hawke swallows. It's nothing more than she deserves, but she'll be untangling Anders' little fit of personal betrayal all night. Time to take the reins of the conversation.

"I'll save my apologies for later, then," she says, reaching without looking for Fenris' hand, and catching it, warm and solid, in hers. She squeezes, and though he doesn't squeeze back, he does weave his fingers through her in wordless acknowledgement. "So, out with it — what happened? A day late, you must have a story for it."

Merrill hums in agreement, and steals back Isabela's mug.

Varric huffs as he drags his fingers through his hair. He looks at his glove, grimaces, and then strips both gloves off and drops them to the table. He looks like utter shit, exhausted and dirty, but he _doesn't_ look disappointed.

Hawke feels the weight behind her begin to fade. The kitchen, filled with all her friends and the smell of good herbs — and yes, even Anders' roiling temper by the fire — is too real to deny, and no dreaming world can compete. So long as she stays here, she's safe. She's _sane._

"Well, the extra day's easy to explain," Varric begins, his voice rolling out of his mouth as smooth as marzipan. "Half of Darktown's flooded, so we had to backtrack, and circle, and —"

"Get to the point, Fuzzy," says Isabela, pouting at Merrill and holding out her hand for her mug. "Or my damn leg'll be healed by the time you're finished."

"Now, now, Rivaini. The scene needs to be set." But Varric straightens on his stool, and looks up at Hawke with clear, hard eyes. "Tomwise gave us a few solid leads on some newcomers who took over a group of city elves' camp, right around the time that graffiti started popping up, so we headed there first."

Hawke nods. The only things keeping her from waving Varric along are one slender thread of patience, and the anchoring weight of Fenris' hand in hers, but when Varric reaches for his mug — he has a captive audience, he knows it, and he can't help himself, damn dwarf — Hawke sucks in a breath and gets ready to urge him on.

For all of two seconds, she gets ready, until something pale moves under the table, and her eyes are drawn helplessly to it.

A white hand slides into the firelight, glistening-wet, and drums its nails on the kitchen floor.

Hawke freezes, then blinks and rubs her eyes, all thoughts of telling Varric to hurry gone from her head. The hand presses itself against the floor, and inches forward. Just a hand, slipping out of the dark.

 _It's just a hand,_ Hawke thinks. _Nothing wrong with a hand._

Nothing wrong with a hand when it's attached to a body, and not lying like a dead starfish on her kitchen floor. The pulse grows heavier, a hammer beating against the inside of her head.

The hand gathers itself into a fist, then spreads flat once more. Hawke hears the faint sucking sound it makes as it creeps from under the table, and sees the tiny puddle of water it leaves behind.

Inch by inch, a fish-pale woman drags herself from under the table on her belly. She slips under Isabela's leg, then stops and pushes herself up on her elbows to sniff the air. The firelight catches the slow flux of gills upon her neck. Her lipless mouth, when she opens it, is full of clear, needle-sharp teeth, and her nose is nothing more than two knife-slits in the middle of her face.

She has no eyes, but she turns unerringly to Hawke, and smiles.

"Hawke," says the woman, and starts to crawl across the kitchen floor. "Hawke. Hawke Hawke _Hawke._ Ha. Ha. Haw. Kuh. Hawke."

It's the voice from the street, like nails scraping on driftwood. The woman pulls the rest of her body from under the table, and Hawke shudders, recoiling — from the waist up, the woman is almost human, but joined to her hips is a thick eel's tail, thrashing against the floor.

"You," the woman says, "you are not _listening_. Hawke. _Hawke_."

 _Stop saying my damn name, whatever you are_. Hawke shuts her eyes, counts to fifteen, and prays. When she opens her eyes, the woman is almost at her feet, one clawed white finger scraping the floor in front of her.

"Listen. Listen," says the woman. "Hawke —" Her fingers grip the bottom of Hawke's dress, and tug, shredding the fine wool like wet paper. "Listen. The pearl. Pearl. Hawke —"

Oh, yes, she's cracked it, once and for all; hallucinating the sea in Kirkwall was only the beginning. The woman hisses through her teeth, tail twitching impatiently in a roil of black-grey scales, and backs slowly under the table.

"Uh, Hawke?" She jerks her head toward Varric, not meeting Fenris' gaze even as it heats the side of her face. Everyone, even Anders, stares at her, shades of the same concern shadowing all their faces. "You all right there?"

"Fine," she manages, her voice bursting strangled and thin from her throat. Fenris' hand tightens on hers, but she can't look at him, she _can't_ , not while a sheen of water coats the kitchen floor and the air around her reeks of brine that no one else smells. "I — what did you just say?"

Anders snarls. "Blast it, Hawke, he said we _know_ who did this." He shoves his hand into a traveling satchel that has sat, silent and unoffending, on the side of the fire for the whole conversation. "This!" he says, waving a round, heavy bottle high. Hawke's skin prickles all over, and her lips pull back from her teeth. "They found _this_ , Hawke, on the body of a dead templar."

He slams the bottle down on the table, where the firelight can lovingly trace the familiar symbol etched on its side. And then, his mouth still frozen in a snarl, Anders looks up at her, fierce cold triumph blazing in his gaze. _Do you still doubt me?_ His gaze meets hers, challenging, satisfied, as the pulse in her head fades to nothing.

Perhaps it should set her at ease; templars are even more familiar than blood mages, and the worst of her horror vanishes with the pulse. But water still coats the floor, and she still tastes blood, in the back of her throat.

The sea remains at her back, waiting.

* * *

Thank you, as always, for reading, and for letting me know what you think!


	7. Chapter 7

Previously: Previously: Hawke's discovery of blood magic beneath the graffiti is refuted on examination by Merrill, but at least Fenris, Isabela, and Varric are home. Of course, they're not bringing any particular good news, but this _is_ Kirkwall. Still, everyone is under the same roof again, and that's more than Hawke had before.

Warnings for: implied depression, unreality, and self-harm.

* * *

Varric takes up his role of storyteller with the usual aplomb — _Darktown was a shit-filled nightmare, which you probably guessed by the Maker-forsaken stench, and all the bandages_ — but the full tale needs barely a quarter of an hour to tell. The very dead templar and two of his equally-deceased comrades were the only residents of the usurped camp, in possession of their armor but none of their weapons — and the bottle was found grasped tight in the first templar's fist.

The armor bothers Hawke. Darktown takes a waste-not, want-not approach to, well, everything, so why were the weapons taken, and not the armor or the pretty bottle? And, more importantly, why in the name of Andraste's sacred ass had they rousted a bunch of harmless elves from their camp?

She holds her tongue, and wonders, silently, as Varric wraps up his story, and her friends yawn and droop over their tea. The questions will keep till the morning. Instead, she paces, and tries not to be too obvious while she watches the space under the table.

"And that," Varric says, "brings us here, and I'm damn beat. Table the rest for tomorrow?" He shuts his eyes, and sighs, but doesn't get up, not even when Merrill helps Isabela off her stool and toward the door.

Anders' mood improved the moment he thought he won his point; he herds Merrill and Isabela upstairs for poultices and hot baths with something approaching cheer, dragging his satisfaction behind him like a fur robe. Nettle follows, nosing at Merrill's free hand and panting all the way up the stairs.

"Glad to see Blondie's all cheered up." Varric spins the bottle, and Hawke grits her teeth against the sound of heavy glass on wood. "He was in a bit of a state when we got back," he adds, each word perfectly bland and definitely not an accusation, but Hawke feels a fresh twist of guilt nonetheless.

"I'm sure he'll remember to be angry at me in the morning." Hawke rubs her palms against her dress, and eyes the dark space under the table. Her legs ache, faintly, from her unaccustomed walking, but if she takes her place on her usual stool, only to feel a cold, clammy hand wrap around her ankle, she'll scream her throat raw. "I'm sorry you had to deal with it," she adds, belatedly, to Varric and Fenris alike.

Varric waves the apology away, then props his elbows on the table. "He didn't let that stop him from taking care of us, so I've got no complaints. Still, you'll want to —"

"Yes, I know, I'll abase myself later, and next time I'll leave a note," Hawke replies, her voice far sharper than she intends. She's weary, and cold, and she can't tell if the flickers beneath the table are from the fire or from her unwanted visitor; the thought of apologizing to Anders yet again, no matter how deserved the apology is, makes her head feel thin as an eggshell. "I'd just like a few hours to regain my strength before the next argument, thanks."

Varric's eyebrows climb toward his hairline. He darts a quick glance past Hawke, to where Fenris stands behind her, and Fenris' hand, which had been rubbing small, gentle circles at the base of her spine, pauses.

 _Oh, balls_. She holds her breath as she waits for him to pull away, but then the circles begin again, as gentle as before.

"How bad was this one?" Varric asks.

Hawke blows her fringe out of her eyes. The memory of Anders' face, high and scornful, cold in the light of his little blue flame, makes her so tired she could slide to the floor now, and sleep for days. "It wasn't anything new. He's disappointed in me, I could be so much more, the city adores me and I should use that — it's _fine_ , Fenris, like I said, it's nothing I didn't already know he thought."

Fenris curses a few seconds more under his breath. Hawke knows most of his favorite Tevene curses by heart, but this one is new, and judging by its length, rather inventive on the subject of Anders' probable parentage. "He has no right —" Fenris begins, then cuts himself off with a hard shake of his head. The firelight casts heavy shadows along the lines of his face, but the dark smudges under his eyes are not from shadow alone. He's too weary to be truly annoyed at Anders, and that is what makes Hawke finally swallow her reluctance and pull him toward a stool.

He sink into it with a low sigh, and takes the mug of tea Varric shoves at him with a nod of thanks. As he reaches for the sugar bowl, Hawke sees a bandage wrapped around his upper arm, and that twist of guilt becomes a knife, straight through her ribs.

Fenris catches her look, and gives her a wry quirk of his lips that isn't quite a smile. "A lucky shot," he says. "Anders —" A bitter note under the word; Hawke wonders if Fenris hears it himself anymore — "examined it, and pronounced it a flesh wound with delusions of grandeur. There is nothing to worry about."

"Not a lucky shot for the idiot with the bow," Varric notes. Then he too sighs, and props his chin on his steepled fingers. "Templars. Shit. Blondie's not gonna let this go."

Hawke reaches for the teapot and cream. "No," she agrees, "he won't."

"I'm not sure I disagree." Varric's eyes are far away when Hawke looks up. "Don't get me wrong, Hawke, I'm not signing up for a copy of his manifesto —"

"Not that anyone needs to," Fenris murmurs darkly, then coughs. Hawke tries not to smile and fails, and finds an answering one on Fenris' mouth when their eyes meet. She presses her thigh to his under the table, not caring, for the moment, about eyeless women or the smell of salt, and he presses back.

 _Thank the Maker for you_ , she thinks, before turning her attention back to Varric.

"— but if the templars are wrapped up in what happened to you, well, that's deep shit."

"Very eloquent, Varric." She takes a prim sip of tea, pleased when neither her jaw nor her new teeth ache as heat fills her mouth. "Can we expect that in the next chapter of _Hard in Hightown_?"

"Hawke," says Fenris, all smiles gone. "I agree."

She stares at him, a cold pit opening in her belly. What was it that Aveline said, years ago, on one of their lonely early trips out to the Wounded Coast? _Keep it simple, Hawke, when you're looking for answers._

For a moment, Hawke misses Aveline with a pure, savage misery: her oldest friend, the one she can trust to cut through all the other bullshit, most of all her own, and deliver the truth. What would she say now, if she knew everything Hawke has seen these past two weeks?

 _Keep it simple_.

The pulse throbs once more at the back of Hawke's skull, then falls quiet. In the silence that remains, Hawke sees the simplest answer, clear as morning: if the templars are involved, then Meredith's hand is the one directing them. Who else in Kirkwall stands to gain the most if the Champion, once so untouchable, is removed from play?

It hardly matters that Hawke has never wanted power. Meredith would see any support from the city as a threat, and the fact that Hawke's walked free for almost a decade is an insult that a lesser woman would have not withstood.

Perhaps it's not a straight line, perhaps a dozen new questions now clutter her head, but it's far simpler than the wide, glittering tapestry Hawke imagined a few hours ago while she sat in the Chantry. Far simpler than blood magic and the sea laughing around every corner, and eyeless women calling her name.

As simple, perhaps, as believing that Anders has been the reasonable one all along. She can, after all, be mad while Meredith plots in the Gallows.

"Shit," Hawke says, and buries her mad head in her hands.

* * *

Weariness ends the conversation moments later. Hawke climbs the stairs to her bedroom with her arm looped through Fenris', with Varric a few steps behind them. A murmured good night at her bedroom door, and then Varric disappears down the hall to the room he appropriated years ago, the heavy rugs muffling his footsteps but not the sound of the door closing behind him.

Now the criers outside call out the approaching dawn, and the only other sound Hawke hears is the quiet splash of Fenris bathing in the other room. Another night, she would have joined him without thinking, shedding clothes and cares in equal measure, but one look at the rippling surface of the water had left her chilled in spite of the bathroom's humid warmth, and she had retreated to her chair with some murmured excuse.

She still feels Fenris' questioning gaze on her back. When was the last time she didn't take the slightest chance to be close to him?

 _Oh, sometime before I lost my bloody mind_. _A bit hard to concentrate on romance when you're having trouble figuring out what's real and what's just a waking nightmare._

Her mouth trembles, and tears threaten, but she refuses to close her eyes. If she does, she'll see again the flickers of movement beneath her kitchen table, as the woman taps her claws on the floor and thrashes her tail in mindless circles. She thinks about the bottle instead, tracing its fine-etched lines with a thumbnail, and wonders why she felt so little when Anders pulled it from its bag.

 _To be fair, it was quite outclassed by what crawled from under the table and called for me by name._

The world truly is amazing, Hawke thinks to herself. One can see all manner of horrors — people burning themselves alive, a bloody crown rolling to a stop at one's feet— and always know that just around the corner the world is waiting to vomit up some other atrocity, more mind-shredding than the last. The only end comes when you surrender, and let the cracks grow so wide you slip through them, into the great nothing that lies beyond.

It appears she reached her limit. Perhaps she reached it a long time ago, in some dark and filthy room under the city, or on a sun-bleached sandbar, and the beating in the Hanged Man merely gave her mind the excuse it was waiting for.

 _Meredith didn't have to go to all this trouble_ , she thinks, bitterly _. It was inevitable, I suppose_.

The surge of self-pity is heavy enough to choke her, but what Hawke feels most is disgust — with herself, with all she's seen. After all, isn't she still safe, isn't her mana still returning? Meredith has made her move, but Hawke is still standing. And she is not defenseless.

She'll see the next blow coming. Mad or not, she still has bloody eyes.

She rubs at the thick gouges on her cheek. Her new teeth are nearly finished growing, and she can breathe almost normally through her nose, but the scars will linger, thick and unavoidable. But at least they're real, and hers, in a way that she no longer believes her own mind to be.

Her thoughts consume her so completely she doesn't hear the bathroom door open, nor does she realize Fenris has called her name till a loud burst of coughing rattles her out of her head. The coughing nearly doubles him over, and lets the firelight limn the solid curve of his spine. In spite of her dark mood and exhaustion, Hawke's hands cramp with a sweet, years-old urge.

But first.

"Oh, no, Fenris." She sets the bottle on her desk, and reaches his side just before the coughing ends. "This really is bad luck."

"I am quite well," Fenris says grimly, then immediately makes himself a liar by sneezing into the crook of his unhurt arm. "To be so unlucky twice in one year —" He sneezes again, and makes an angry-cat face as he tosses his wet hair back.

"A good thing I've still got some of the poultice." Caring for Fenris will be a welcome distraction — not to mention the first step in repaying all his vigilance over the last week.

Fenris sneezes twice more while Hawke rummages in a chest for the cold, familiar jar. She guides him toward the bed, hiding a smile as he looks ever more aggrieved; once he's situated with his legs stretched out before him and his back propped against the headboard, she uncorks the jar and scoops out a handful of the contents. "Ready?"

He nods, eyes sliding half-closed as she begins to spread the poultice over his skin. Hawke works slowly, each touch light in case his markings begin to bother him as they had when he fell sick not two months before. Tonight, mercifully, they give him no trouble, and she spreads a thin layer from collarbones to hips without pause.

Taking care of Fenris has lost none of its novelty, nor any of its sweetness; she remembers the years he could hardly stand to be touched at all, and says a quiet prayer of thanks for how easily he gives her his trust now. She lets her hands linger a few moments longer than the task demands, grateful for the smooth planes of muscle and skin under her fingers, and the heart beating steadily against her palm.

"I worried," Fenris says, "when I returned and you were not here."

Hawke casts about for a handkerchief to clean her hands. "I didn't think," she replies, to his gentle reproach. "I'm sorry."

"As Varric said, Anders had a great deal to say, though Isabela's wound distracted him before he could reach his usual pitch." A smile tugs at the corners of Fenris' mouth, though he keeps his eyes closed. "I doubt she would appreciate my gratitude, however."

"That wound did look unpleasant." Hawke works the handkerchief between each of her fingers, and glances up at Fenris through the sweep of her fringe. "Three to one odds, Varric said."

"Opportunists, with more ambition than sense." Now Fenris opens his eyes, and leans forward to pull the handkerchief away and clasp her hand in both of his. "Hawke," he says — and that's all he needs to say, really, for her cheeks to burn and smart. Remorse is a bitter lump in her throat, and not just for Fenris: none of her friends deserved to worry, least of all Anders, who's been as patient as he can this past week.

"I know," she says, meeting his eyes. The candlelight catches faint flecks of gold in his irises and the warm burnished skin on his cheeks, and deep in his pupils she sees herself reflected, too small for any of her new scars to show.

"Remember to leave a note next time," he says after a moment, one corner of his mouth twitching upward wryly. "I can save my worry for more pressing matters, then."

She laughs, strained and high. "A smart move," she says. "Always plenty of reason to worry around here."

His gaze sharpens — whether from her words or simply from how they were said — and Hawke briefly wishes she could kick herself in the ass.

"Hawke," Fenris says again. Not a request, and barely a question; he won't force her to answer what he hasn't asked.

The smell of salt burns the inside of her nose. She tries to imagine herself laying all her troubles at his feet — _Fenris, my love, what would you say if I told you I'd lost my mind? Let me guess: "Tell me something I don't know"_ — and falters before the words make it past her throat. All this time since the Hanged Man, he's never once looked at her with pity, and she couldn't stand it if he started now.

Hawke presses her lips together, and makes herself hold his gaze. Fenris waits, then chafes her hand between his and nods. He will wait, says the quiet gesture, as long as she needs.

She leans forward and kisses him, quick and sweet, ready to tell him she doesn't deserve his smallest smile, but he kisses her back with more heat than she expects.

 _Oh, right,_ she thinks, a little dizzy when his tongue sweeps against her lips. _We haven't done this in a while_. Then his hand cradles the back of her head, his fingers buried in her hair, and all thoughts flee for a few brief seconds. She tastes tea on his breath, and sugar, and then just _Fenris_. If she forgets everything else in this world, she will still remember his mouth, warm and alive, and oh, it's been too long.

Fenris sighs — a small noise, almost lost in the rustling of the sheets as he moves closer — and Hawke feels herself go cold from head to toe, in spite of the warmth of his hands and kisses. She's never lied to Fenris, not once, and while Varric might argue that _holding back_ is a far cry from actually _lying_ , something in her shrivels at the thought of making love with her secret held between them.

She pulls away, reluctantly, though she keeps Fenris' hand clasped tight in her own. His mouth is slick and warm from their kissing, a temptation Hawke barely resists, but the heat in his eyes fades as he studies her face.

"To bed, then." He kisses the corner of her mouth, then pulls away to sneeze once more into the crook of his arm.

Hawke hides most of her laugh, then slips out of bed to undress. "An excellent plan," she says, conscious of being forgiven far too quickly, and of how quickly her own heart is beating. She plucks at the laces of her dress, blowing out the candles as she goes, but the low fire gives off enough light to set the shredded patch of hem glowing as she tugs the dress down her hips.

She could have caught it on a rough stone. Nettle could have torn it in one of her greetings. A thousand reasons exist for a torn hem, and all of them are more plausible than the one Hawke remembers.

 _Keep it simple, you little fool._

"To hell with this," she mutters. She balls up the dress and stuffs it into the hamper — maybe she'll burn it tomorrow, now that she has the mana to start a fire — and turns back to Fenris in her smalls. She can't make out his expression with most of the candles extinguished, but she feels his eyes upon her. He says nothing, only pulls back the covers once she's slipped into her nightdress, and rests his head on hers when she curls into his side.

He dozes in moments; another night, the gentle rise and fall of his chest would lull Hawke to sleep almost as quickly, but she lies awake for some time, listening for the sound of claws.

* * *

The first grey light of dawn wakes Hawke as it slips between her curtains. She groans and rolls away without opening her eyes, ready to throw an arm around Fenris' chest and doze till the day is half gone. The bed is empty when she reaches for him, only a shadow of his warmth remaining, but nearby she hears someone trying to smother a cough, as quietly as they can.

She brushes a few strands of hair out of her face as she sits up. They're matted and sticky where the poultice has rubbed off in their sleep — it'll be pure hell to wash out later — and she grimaces into the dim room.

"Fenris?" she says, her voice warm and blurred from sleep.

The choked-off noise stops, and the bed creaks as his weight settles on the edge of the mattress. "Forgive me." A hand cups the curve of her jaw. Hawke leans into it, nearly purring. "I did not wish to wake you." A cough blisters out of him as soon as the last word leaves his mouth, the same dank rattle she heard from Merrill the night before.

"It's all right, you don't have to worry about that," Hawke knows he will continue doing exactly that, no matter how much he coughs. "Let me get the poultice. I'll have Bodahn bring up water later, we'll see if we can't steam this out of you."

Fenris falls back on the propped-up pillows as Hawke pads toward her desk, and the still-cold jar upon it. "The last cold was bad enough," he says, as close to complaining as she's ever heard him. "Truly, this is bad luck."

"But _lucky_ for you, it's my turn to aggressively nursemaid you." Hawke uncorks the jar as Fenris huffs a laugh in her direction. It's nearly empty, barely a film left at the bottom. "Shit."

"Hawke?"

"Oh, everything's fine," she says, glaring at the jar, already dreading the walk down to her cold workroom off the kitchen. She hasn't touched it in nearly two weeks, so its fire will be well and truly dead, and since she seems to be allergic to asking Bodahn to fix the drafty door, she may have frostbite to look forward to as well. "We're nearly out. I'll go make more, if you're all right?"

"I am quite well," Fenris says, then groans quietly. "It can wait," he amends, when she glances over her shoulder at him with a smirk. "Come back to bed, Hawke."

"As inviting as that invitation is, it'll take just a few minutes to whip up some more. Besides, we'll need more for Merrill." She toes into her slippers and wraps herself in her robe, then steps around to Fenris' side of the bed to kiss his forehead. "Minutes, love, nothing more," she says, smiling when he tries to insinuate his arm around her waist.

He sighs, the breath coming hard through his mouth, and closes his eyes.

 _Fifty silvers says he's asleep by the time I come back upstairs_ , Hawke thinks. She shuts the door silently, and heads down the stairs, empty jar in hand.

Her house is just as cold as she expected, filled with the held-breath quiet of a snowy morning. The fire in the parlor is out, only a few embers still glow in the kitchen's fireplace. Barely enough light comes through the window over the sink to let Hawke pick her way to her workroom, but a candle flares into life at the table to spread a golden glow over the kitchen. Two faces turn toward Hawke at the same time — and all the breath leaves her lungs, her stomach drops, and the jar tumbles from her nerveless fingers.

"Finally. We were starting to think you were never coming down." Bethany leans into the candlelight, dimpling as she smiles knowingly at Hawke. "Come now, Mother, I told you not to worry if she's late. She has _so_ many reasons to stay in bed. Don't you, sister?"

The name strikes Hawke square in the breastbone. No one calls her _sister_ these days, but it rolls off Bethany's tongue like they're sitting at the kitchen table in Lothering, waiting for Father and Carver to come in from the fields.

Their mother sniffs, though she's fighting a smile as she toys with her necklace.

"But I'm sure Mother doesn't want to hear that," says Bethany. "Sit down."

Hawke collapses into a stool, too stunned to resist the command in her sister's voice. Bethany beams as she places a bowl and spoon directly in front of her.

"You'll love this," Bethany says. "We made it while you were sleeping. Go ahead, taste it."

Their mother stays silent, her hands never pausing on her necklace. The beads click against each other as they slide on their string.

Hawke digs her fingernails into her thigh, waiting for pain to jolt her back to her waking life, but though the pain rolls up her leg, she stays at the table, with her mother and Bethany smiling at her sweetly.

What new trick of her broken mind is this, that even pain does nothing to bring her home? She can smell her mother's sachet, a faint hint of violets, and the cool moss-and-rain texture of Bethany's magic settles around her like an embrace. Absurdly — she should be terrified, she should be _screaming_ — Hawke wishes Carver were here, just so he could see them again. Bethany looks so beautiful.

She can hardly bear to look at either of them, so she drops her eyes to the bowl before her. A thick, opaque slurry fills the bowl, and the sides are crusted with a thin rind of salt. With a disgusted hiss, she shoves the bowl away, then pushes off her stool as some of the slurry slops over the side.

Bethany sighs. "She's not listening," she says to their mother, who nods sadly, her eyes never leaving Hawke's face. "Sister, you will sit _down_ and eat. We worked so very hard to bring this to you. We're getting better all the time."

"Like the sea?" Hawke snaps, as something in her head begins to vibrate like the plucked string of a harp. If she's to be mad, can't she just skip straight to the drooling and gibbering and be fucking done with these little games? "Like that fish woman under the table? Is she there now?" She makes a show of ducking down to check, but finds nothing except the legs of the table and the stool. Her mother and sister end at the hips, the tattered edges of their robes fluttering slightly in the draft from the workroom.

"Don't play games," says her sister. She bares her teeth in something that bears no resemblance to a smile, and the needle-fine points of her teeth glimmer. "Eat your soup."

"There's no bloody way I'm putting that in my mouth, no matter how —" _No matter how mad I've gone_.

"You're not mad," says Bethany, in a cold sing-song that sounds nothing like her. "You're not mad at all, sister. Eat your soup."

Their mother plucks at her necklace again, the beads catching the light — but no beads would glow so warmly or slip through the fingers so easily. They're pearls, as big as her thumbnail, and one is missing from the string.

Her heart beats fast as a drum, but that's nothing to the pulse feathering in the back of her skull. _Come closer_ , it beckons.

If this isn't real, and she's mad, then she hurts no one by playing along. Resistance has only brought her pain; it's time to try something new.

She takes a step forward, and another, inching closer to the table as her mother and Bethany watch her with calm, expectant faces, and curls one hand around the bowl. "What is it?" she asks, belatedly, hardly hearing her own voice.

"Taste it," says Bethany. Their mother smiles, all gracious encouragement.

She'd smiled while Hawke held her, in that filthy white gown, while she forgave her daughter for that last, colossal favor. This isn't Leandra Amell, and Hawke knows this, but a part of her leaps at that smile, clings to it with miserable longing. And that's nothing to the hopeless tangle of grief and regret that swallows when she looks at Bethany. Sweet, round-cheeked Bethany — Hawke buried her ashes in the ruins of the farm, near the back pasture, but she's smiling too, reaching out to wrap one cold hand around Hawke's wrist.

"Just one taste," says Bethany. "And then _listen_."

Surely Hawke can do that much for her family, and if she's either mad or dreaming, or both, who can it hurt? She lifts the bowl, her stomach rolling as the contents shift heavily, and closes her eyes.

The slurry, warm as spit and honey-thick, barely touches her lips before Bethany hisses. Hawke opens her eyes to find her mother and sister glaring toward the door, teeth bared and eyes slitted.

"Too late," says Bethany, her familiar voice sliding down, down, down till it rasps like sand over the skin. "Too late, Hawke, too late to drink or listen."

"What?" she asks, stupidly. She feels the bowl shift in her hands, and sees a thin, fragile fish spine break the surface before sinking again. Another hiss distracts her before she fully processes that new horror, but there's no one at the table when she looks up. No candle burns, and there's nothing in her hands.

Of course there's not. Maker, she's not even surprised anymore. She's simply tired, wrung out like a dishrag, and there's still the poultice to make.

She steps away from the table and bites off a cry as she treads on the broken pieces of the jar. Two of the larger shards dig into the arch and heel of her foot through her slipper, and she swears under her breath as she drops onto a stool to pick them out.

"Hawke," says Fenris. He's standing at the door, barefoot and adorably rumpled, but for the first time in her life, Hawke feels only weariness when she sees him, and a little dread.

"I thought I told you to stay in bed," she says, her voice coming out curiously flattened. With a tug, she pulls one of the pieces free, and tosses it to the table. "Was I gone that long?" _And how much did you see?_

"Long enough to worry me." He doesn't take a step toward her. Perhaps his careful distance should worry her, but it's a relief. Gentleness would undo her. "You're distressed."

Hawke laughs again, the sound spiraling out of her like the cry of a wounded fox. "And that's only the beginning!" She tugs the second piece free, but clenches it in her hand till the sharp edges pierce her skin. Blood flows hot and reassuring down her palm and over her wrist, and only then does she let the piece fall to the floor.

"Do not -" Fenris takes a step toward her, arms outstretched, but she shakes her head. Would that everyone and everything would stop saying her name, over and over, till the sound doesn't make sense any longer. "I will not ask again, but you can…confide in me, whatever has happened. Do not torment yourself."

Impossible not to look at him when he says such things. Hawke faces him, her bleeding hand cradled in her lap, and sighs. Then she waits for the tears to come, and the fear of what he'll look like when she's done talking.

No tears, and only a faint rill of fear before the numbness blankets everything save the pulse still beating in her head. Even the sea has left her, and taken its salt-scented air away. There's nothing left to do but tell the truth.

 _It certainly can't make things worse_. She considers her bloody hand, and a low, quiet part of her relishes the pain.

"I've gone mad, Fenris," she says. His eyes grow dark as she tells her story, but he comes to sit beside her, and takes her wounded hand in his.


	8. Chapter 8

Previously: After a near-dawn encounter with the apparitions of her dead mother and sister, Hawke finally confesses all her fears and worries to Fenris. Her questions still remain, and the sea still haunts the edges of her life - but for now, she'll take what peace she can.

 **AN:** This chapter contains a mature but non-explicit sex scene, as well as some unreality/dream violence.

* * *

When the Champion's voice fades into silence, Orsino tends the candles and lamps that died while she told her story. He leaves the brandy where it is, and doesn't listen to whether or not she takes a drink. If half of what she says is true, she's welcome to the entire bottle.

 _Can't I trust her?_ he asks himself, touching fingertips to wicks and adding oil to bowls. _After all, don't the rumors say she only lies to templars?_

His reflection in the rain-washed window doesn't smile. He's the First Enchanter. Trust is not a risk he can take.

Orsino returns to his chair once the room is bathed again in light. Hawke's eyes stay fixed on her clasped hands — fine, long-fingered hands, with rough knuckles and calluses from wrists to fingers. No matter where she goes, those hands will mark her, in ways no scent or fine dresses can hide.

His own hands ache, as they always do when it rains, and when he brushes down the front of his robe, his own calluses catch on the embroidery. Marked they both are, but no one in Thedas would see him as anything other than a Circle mage — something in the eyes, he thinks, a certain light long-doused and dark.

Hawke's eyes gleam, cold and wary, when she lifts her head. In better light, her scars are plain as words inked on a page. Perhaps she's bared them to garner pity, or to lend weight to her case — but Orsino has known his answer to her plea since she froze his lock, and her scars don't move him.

Curiosity, however, does.

"What did Fenris say?" he asks.

Her face remains unreadable and calm, but Orsino thinks he sees something flash in the depths of her gaze. A scream, held down by sheer force of will. He knows the look, has seen it a thousand times, and has remind himself not to smile.

 _Ah, Champion, you almost look like one of us._

The thought is beneath him. He is her last safe harbor — sheer, bitter irony — and she has defended the mages for seven years. He can afford to be kind. It's the very least he can do, after all, he reminds himself, as a little chill runs through him.

"Fenris said —" Hawke smiles wistfully, her eyes sliding away to rest on her folded hands. "Fenris trusts me," she says. "I've never lied to him, you know. I've lied my bloody face off to almost everyone else, one way or another, but never to him. Because he stayed with me, long enough to —" A sigh, almost soundless "He let me pour this whole mad story into his ears and held my hands the whole time, and then he said _I believe you, Hawke,_ and got a cloth to clean my cuts. And when that was done, he asked me what I wanted to do next. Do you understand? He just wanted to _help_. He is a good man."

"Quite the rarity in Kirkwall," Orsino murmurs. He can't count himself among them.

Hawke's mouth twitches. "Quite the rarity anywhere," she says. "For a little while, it seemed so simple. Just another problem to solve, and we'd built our lives on solving impossible ones. It could be done."

Before Orsino can ask what changed, a knock sounds at the door. He doesn't recognize the sound for what it is until the person on the other side of the door pounds their fist on the wood again.

He lurches out of his seat, startled into clumsiness and cursing himself for not paying attention, and knocks half the contents of his desk to the ground. Books, letters, and scrolls scatter across the floor, an inkwell spilling across the top layer, but there's no time for dismay. Just dread.

"First Enchanter!" says the templar. "Open up, would you?"

Ah, yes, the _would you_ , the barest nod to his supposed rank and influence, but any word from a templar is an order.

"Of course." He glances toward Hawke's seat, his mouth dry. But Hawke has already moved, drawing her dark hood over her face and standing against the wall next to the door, where she'll be — however briefly — shielded from sight. It won't last for long should the templar decide to come in, but if she's very quiet, if she doesn't breathe at all —

There's no sense in delaying. Hawke's eyes gleam as Orsino mutters to himself, clothing himself in the guise of the diffident, distracted scholar, and pulls open the door.

"Yes?" he says, standing just so, to give the templar the full view of the chaos now filling his office. "Is there something you need, lieutenant?"

"Isn't it a bit late for you to be up studying?" says the templar, scanning Orsino and the room behind him with tired, indifferent eyes. It's Franklin, a potato-shaped ostler's son with more spots than sense, but mercifully without a mean or curious streak in his body. Whatever comes out of his mouth is exactly what his superiors put in his head. Easy to predict, easier to maneuver.

"It's hard to find time during the day for my own studies," Orsino says, so softly the sound of his own voice makes him want to bite off his tongue. "And I find I like the quiet, lieutenant."

"Huh." Franklin sticks his tongue into his cheek and mulls that over for a while. "Still, it's late. You should be in your room."

Hawke is a dark blur at the edge of Orsino's vision, one pale hand pressed to her chest. Perhaps she's praying. If he thought it would do any good, Orsino might join her.

"Soon enough," Orsino promises, nodding along, just a helpless mage eager to return to his studies, and not someone sheltering an illicit visitor. "Just a few more pages, then I'll go —"

"Say." Franklin squints at the door. "What happened to your lock there, First Enchanter?"

Hawke's eyes close, very slowly, and a fine, cold sheen of sweat breaks out on Orsino's back. He forgot the bloody lock, the lock that now exists only in a pile of gleaming shards at his feet.

"An accident with one of my students," he says. "A slightly misdirected spell, nothing more. I'll have it repaired in the morning."

Almost any other templar would have asked which student, but Franklin's most useful quality — his complete lack of original thought — works as well for Orsino as it does for Meredith. "See that you do," he says, nodding meaningfully at the door. "Don't see why you need a lock on your door at all," he adds, in echo of all his superiors, as he walks away. "Mages don't get locks."

Orsino nearly points out that mages _do_ get locks quite often in the Gallows, but never keys. He manages to keep his silence and just nods as he steps back into his office.

"Get to bed, First Enchanter!" Franklin calls without looking back. Orsino watches until he disappears around a corner, scans the corridor to make sure no others approach, then closes the door and begins to gather up the papers spilled on the floor.

"You risk a great deal, Champion," he says, stuffing a treatise on the effect of healers upon the mad into a monograph on the Tevinter magister Regeane Ilago, and setting them both on his desk. The spilled ink ruined three letters, but as it's a coin toss if they would be sent or not, he doesn't mourn them too greatly. "If he had caught you…"

Hawke peels herself away from the wall. As her hand falls from her chest, Orsino sees the gleam of a golden chain, before it disappears under the folds of her cloak again. She bends, and scoops up the scrolls closest to her. "He wouldn't have caught me," she says, not looking up. "I'm protected."

He wonders if Hawke hears the confidence in her voice, or if it's so much a part of her now it's become inaudible. "What kind of protection?" he asks, curiosity winning briefly over dislike.

Hawke doesn't answer.

"As you wish." Orsino takes her armful of scrolls, and sets them on his desk. He'll have to spend all of tomorrow organizing. "Shall we continue?"

Hawke retrieves the bottle of brandy from beside her chair and takes an impressive swallow as she sits. "This really is absolute shit, you know." Her voice is remarkably steady for a woman who just drank more in two hours than Orsino drinks in an entire year.

Orsino watches her set the bottle aside and wipe her mouth with the same mix of envy and dislike, sharpened now by the unease left by Franklin's visit. If only Hawke would get to her point — but this confession is not unlike her dance with the Arishok, where she ran and ran until she could run no more, and then turned with her hands full of fire.

Patience and kindness, he reminds himself, are worth the risk. Hawke's secret confession will stay with him, silent and safe, until Meredith makes her final play. And then —

Well. He either won't be alive to worry over betraying this trust, or he'll be out of reach of anyone in Kirkwall, even the Champion.

 _It will be worth it_ , he tells himself for the thousandth time. _Anything is worth freedom. And you, Champion, are just one woman._

If there's one lesson he's learned here in the Gallows, it's that lives can be spent cheaper than any coin, and no one is exempt — a fact he's quite sure Meredith has forgotten.

Whether the Champion has remains to be seen.

* * *

 ** _Two weeks earlier._**

Anders is the healer, but they've all become fair hands at bandages and poultices over these last seven years. Fenris cleans the cuts on her hand and foot with patient, deft movements, so gently Hawke barely notices the sting of elfroot. What she does feel, she relishes, the way she thinks a sailor would savor the first familiar buoy.

If Fenris notices, he gives no sign, but stays focused on his work, head bent and face hidden. Neither of them have said a word since he last spoke, but the echoes hang over them, lighter than smoke.

 _I believe you, Hawke_. He touched her cheek as he said it, his thumb at the corner of her mouth, and tried to smile. Then he rose from his stool, and went to the sink to soak a cloth in warm water, and set about the work of cleaning up yet one more of her messes.

"Thank you," she says at last, as he ties the bandage over her palm. "For this, and for — for the other thing. I don't —" She watches Fenris' hands as he folds the extra bandages into a soft pile, then plunges forward. "You're not worried, love?"

Fenris raises his brows. "When have I not worried about you? The singing — the lack of it — should have been my first clue," he says, a faint, rueful slope in his voice under the congestion. He muffles a cough in the curve of his arm.

"Be serious," Hawke says, feeling a smile tug at her mouth in spite of the jagged laugh still waiting in her throat. She hasn't had a thought for a song in what seems like an age, and hasn't missed the sound of Orana practicing, but how like Fenris to notice that particular silence. "Maker, I think that's the first time I've ever said that to you. But really, Fenris — what I just told you would have had Aveline, I don't know, gnawing through her desk."

"I am not Aveline."

"I think I would have noticed by now, if you were."

"What I mean to say," Fenris says, not raising his voice, but taking her hand in his and turning it over to inspect his handiwork, "is that Aveline's duties have kept her from traveling with you as much as I have. The things we have seen together…" He sighs. The sound could mean anything. "I learned to believe you a long time ago."

After days of wrestling with her own mind, and its evidently tenuous relationship to reality, Fenris' unadorned confidence in her seems like its own kind of madness. She stares at him, mouth open like a fish —

 _Let's find a different metaphor, shall we?_

— as she realizes that the question before her is the same, whether she's mad or not: _What do we do next_?

"Well then," she says, catching his hand before he pulls away. Her palm aches with each movement, but she pays more attention to the warmth in his fingers, a fever against her own chilled skin. "I think another thank you is in order, or a few _thousand_ , because I can't tell you how much I — how I thought —"

She's babbling, now that relief has begun to make its way past her bewilderment. Fenris believes her. Mad she may be, but she isn't alone, and oh, what a difference that makes.

"I thought —" The sentence refuses to be finished, so Hawke just stares down at their linked hands. Her eyes prickle, but no tears come. Perhaps their time is over.

"No thanks are needed." He leans forward, till their foreheads brush, till all she sees when she looks up are his eyes. His free hand cups the back of her head; he's close enough for Hawke to hear the quiet rattle, deep in his chest. "What comes next, Hawke?"

Four words spoken, a near-decade of loyalty and love beneath them. "I think I'd like to keep my mana secret a little longer. Never known when surprise will be useful," she says, wondering _Does he regret its return?_ , watching his face through her hair, but he only nods, calmly, in agreement.

"After that, to be perfectly honest," she adds, trying for glib and falling far short, "I hadn't thought past _tell Fenris everything and hope he doesn't walk out the door_."

He exhales hard through his teeth, the first hint of frustration he's shown all morning. "I hope that is an exaggeration," he says, openly reproachful now.

Hawke nods, a little sheepish. "I didn't think you would leave _permanently_ , love."

Fenris groans. "Hawke…"

She holds up her hands in surrender. It's easy for him to say he'd remain, no matter what came out of her mouth, but he hadn't seen the way his face darkened like a storm rolling in over Lothering when she described the sea surging toward her house — or the sideways lurch the world took when Carver made his visit, or the obscene slap of the woman's tail on the floor.

What would she have done, if he really had walked away?

 _Don't I have enough to weep over?_ she thinks, acidly. But her belly is cold at the thought, and her heart feels strange and still in her chest.

Better to be grateful that he has stayed, and to consider his question. What does come next?

She presses her unbandaged knuckles to her mouth."I don't know what comes next," she says at last, though Fenris hasn't moved nor given any sign of impatience. "I should…talk to Aveline? Go back to Darktown, perhaps? Or maybe the — the Hanged Man."

She isn't proud of the catch in her voice, but nothing in Fenris' face or the way he touches her makes her think she should be ashamed of it, either.

"Really, there are so many things to do, and places to for me to go —"

"For _us_ to go," interrupts Fenris. He muffles a cough in the crook of his arm, then takes up her hands again, fingers braceleting her wrists. "You need decide nothing tonight."

That easily, the invisible yoke on her shoulders lifts, and she falls forward to rest her head on her knees. The sea presses at the borders of her mind, but it's a distant concern at the moment. She's so bloody tired she could stay here all day, so long as Fenris holds her hands in his.

"I want you to promise me something, Hawke."

"Anything," Hawke says, sitting up. What a pleasure to be able to say something so large so easily, and with such truth.

"Promise me you'll tell me, should you see such things again." The smallest, saddest smile crosses his face, then disappears. "You need face nothing alone."

Those words will haunt her later, in ways she cannot yet imagine, but she makes him this promise, and seals it by kissing his palm.

* * *

To Hawke's surprise, she drops into a deep, unbroken sleep as soon as she and Fenris crawl back into bed. She kept them downstairs long enough after her confession to make a fresh batch of the poultice, and the last thing she hears before she passes out of wakefulness is the new, smoother edge of his breathing.

No dreams trouble her for some hours, and the passing crier wakes her at midmorning. Weariness still clings to her like spiderwebs, and her entire body aches as if she's carried a heavy load for many, many miles — but she only aches, she realizes, because she's put her burden down.

The thought makes her guilty and grateful in equal measure, and she rolls to her side with her eyes closed to thank Fenris again — as if she could ever thank him enough, for all he's done and is doing — and finds his side of the bed cool and empty.

She sits up, sheets clutched to her chest, heart beating a jagged staccato against her ribs. He's gone. Sometime in the night, he thought better of staying with her through this newest disaster; if she turns her head, she'll find an immaculately-written letter of farewell.

"You're an idiot," she says, through gritted teeth. She digs her fingers into her hair, and presses her thumbnail into the tender, healing skin at her temple. "Have a little faith before you fly off into a bloody panic, you stupid little —"

"If this is the response I get for fetching more water," drawls Fenris, kicking the door closed behind him, "you may get your own, from now on."

As always, Hawke's face speaks far more eloquently than any collection of words she might manage to put together. Fenris takes one look at her, his eyes narrow the slightest fraction, and he sets the jug aside on Hawke's desk.

"You have nothing to fear," he says, patient as always, but stern now, implacable. "I am here, Hawke."

"I know," she says, through a thick throat, because it's true, and because breakfast is not the best time for examining one's crippling existential doubt, and drops her eyes to the covers. "I'm sorry. I just —"

She shakes her head, amazed at how she's managed to stay dry-eyed yet again. "I'm being foolish," she finishes. "Ignore me, it's what I would do in your place."

Fenris hums, noncommittal, and comes to sit beside her on the bed. He says nothing, but strokes her scarred cheek with fingers light and warm as sunlight. She almost flinches away — not from fear, or pain, but from a newborn instinct to hide this most obvious sign of her shame and weakness — but holds herself still, pulse trembling in her throat.

He would not touch her so if he would ever leave her. This path she's walked, never lying to Fenris in word or deed, is not one she's walked alone. As many times as she needs to hear it, he will say it.

 _Do him a favor, and don't make him say it again_ , she tells herself, and then, finally, leans into his touch. His palm cradles her cheek perfectly while his thumb traces the deepest scar beside her eye.

Being touched by Fenris is like bathing in light; he barely has to move his hand before Hawke feels a flush build in her cheeks, then slip down her neck. She thinks, vaguely, of hot days on the farm, when the sun drenched the garden and the breeze carried the smell of herbs to you, no matter where you stood. Hawke smell herbs now, though she knows that's just the remains of the poultice — the remains she wears as much as Fenris does — but the sensation of light remains, and with it, peace.

That sensation lasts as long as she keeps her eyes closed. When she opens them, her gaze falls not on Fenris' face, but on the wedge of smooth, bronze skin bared by the open collar of his shirt. His markings gleam, quiet and still as marble, but it's not the markings that draw her eye and hold it: the leaping pulse in his own throat does that, a flutter nearly hidden by the sweep of his hair.

Light becomes heat, kindling as quickly as it had the night before. Fenris keeps up his gentle touches, seemingly unaware of the warmth moving through Hawke's body, but when she turns her head to kiss the inside of his wrist, his skin feels as warm as hers beneath her lips.

His breath stutters, but he doesn't move. Even now, body drawn tight as a bowstring, Fenris will wait for her signal.

 _Well then,_ Hawke thinks, almost laughing from dizzy relief and desire, _let's make it a good signal, then, shall we?_

She threads the fingers of one hand through his hair — so long now the longest strands nearly reach his shoulders — and with the other cups the back of his neck. Fenris lets out a long, heavy breath, arching toward her, that delicious flutter still beating just under his skin.

Hawke considers the direct route — crawling into his lap and setting her teeth ever so lovingly, ever so gently, to that bit of skin — and discards it. They haven't made love for almost two bloody weeks; in that time she's both nearly died _and_ gone mad, and an anchor Fenris has been through it all. She'll _worship_ him, and beg forgiveness for the little blasphemy later.

With the slightest pressure she can manage, Hawke draws Fenris toward her, till their mouths nearly brush. He doesn't blink, not once, as she cards her hand through his hair and lets it fall, silent as snow, back into place.

"You should know," she says, just before she kisses him, "the day I met you —"

Fenris finishes her sentence for her, surging forward to kiss her, sending them both tumbling to the mattress. The sudden burst of speed takes Hawke off-guard, and she sprawls beneath him in a graceless heap to tangle in the covers.

"Hawke?" he says against her mouth, breaking the kiss long enough to meet her eyes.

How much difference a few hours' can make; she's still heartsore, and dreamless sleep aside, she still sees a mouth full of needle-teeth if she closes her eyes. But she's told the truth, and there is nothing between them now but air and a few layers of clothing.

 _What will a full day of this bring me_? she thinks, nearly giddy as she smiles up at him. Nothing, not one thing, hurts.

" _Please_ ," she says, winding her legs around his hips and running her hands through his hair once more. He groans, and even through a stuffed nose and raw throat, the sound makes Hawke's thighs tremble. Her damned smalls — if she just lets go of his hair for a moment, she can slip them off and —

Worshipping. Right.

She kisses him, unhurried, as the sunlight makes its slow march over the bed. Fenris makes no move to slip out of his clothes, and so Hawke stays where she is, pinned by the solid weight of his body. They could do this every day, for a hundred years, for a thousand, and Hawke will still gasp when Fenris presses his mouth to the hollow beneath her ear.

"Here," she manages, as Fenris pulls the collar of her nightdress open and makes his silent way over her collarbone and toward her breasts. "Love, wait, roll over."

"Hm?" Fenris looks up, mouth swollen from their kisses and eyes heavy-lidded. Hawke holds her breath, and prays — another blasphemy, surely — that for as long as memory lasts, she remembers his face.

"Roll over," she says, wriggling out of his arms and up onto her knees. Fenris turns on his side, one hand stroking the line of her thigh through her nightdress. "Onto your _back_ , Fenris."

"As you say," he says, smooth as glass, but he can't hide the avid, hungry look in his eyes as she starts to undo the buttons on his trousers.

"You're wearing far too many clothes," she says primly, moving on to the laces. The heat under her fingers is astonishing, and it takes a great deal of patience to not simply rip his clothes away. Judging by Fenris' expression — or his deliberate _lack_ of one — his thoughts are moving along the same path. "I hope you don't mind me resolving that issue."

"Not at all." Fenris lifts his hips as she tugs his trousers off, and lies still and watchful, wearing only his bandage, while Hawke tosses them across the room. That done, she lies next to him on her side, and smooths her hand down his chest as she swings her leg over both of his. Fenris shivers, the pulse in his neck jumping again as she puts her lips to his ear.

"Do you remember," she whispers, "the night after that awful Duke's hunting party?" She lets her hand fall a little lower, coasting over his ribs, and now his belly.

Fenris gives her a jerky nod that she feels rather than sees. "After Carver and I —" He thinks better of the sentence at once, before Hawke can think to tease him. "After I rescued you."

"Exactly." Hawke touches the tip of her tongue to his earlobe. Maker, her whole body is awake, warm and filled with sweet golden light, and she might be mad but at least she still can take joy in this. "After your daring rescue, when we stayed in that inn before sailing home?"

"I —" Fenris' eyes close briefly, as her hand skims over his bare hip. "I could hardly forget," he says, voice strained.

Hawke smiles against his neck, and slips her hand one inch further. His eyes fly wide, his lips part; the only noise he makes is the smallest sigh Hawke has ever heard. "Nor could I," she says, her rhythm already found.

For someone who hasn't made love in nearly two weeks, he makes an admirable attempt to stay quiet, but Hawke knows precisely the twist of her wrist that will break his silence — she waits to use it till he's thrusting into her hand and breathing hard, and then he cries out, back arching, and smothers any other noise he could make with a fevered, urgent kiss.

"You —" he begins. Hawke presses one finger of her free hand to his lips.

"The inn, Fenris. Where we were nearly chased out for…what did the innkeeper call it? _Disturbing the peace_?"

He nods, color high in his cheeks, and half-rises when she reaches for the hem of her nightdress.

"Oh, no." She balances one hand on his chest while she crouches between his legs. Fenris' breathing fills the room, though he's gone utterly still. "Stay there, love, and let me remind you _how_ disturbing we were."

Fenris laughs, and throws one arm over his eyes. He might have said something else, but Hawke chooses that moment to lower her head, and words leave them both.

She teases — oh, does she _tease_ — until he's begun to thrust, small desperate movements. Then she sits, gently pushes him to his back again when he starts to rise, and shifts up to straddle his hips.

"So eager." Hawke rolls her hips once, and Fenris exhales like he's taken a blow to the gut. "Just what a lady likes to see."

"Hawke," he groans through clenched teeth, his eyes half-closed.

"I'm merely admiring how engaged you are in the proceedings," she replies, running her nails lightly down his chest. There are several paths the next few minutes could take, each as exquisite as the rest, but by the way Fenris' hips strain upward under her, there's only one path she can choose.

She pulls her nightdress over her head, and then holds still while Fenris' gaze slowly travels from her hips to her face. His hands follow where his eyes have led, cupping her breasts in hands no longer warm but hot. Hawke wriggles a little under his touch, and every motion leaves them both groaning.

Only her smalls remain, a flimsy band of red silk already slipping low on her hips, and now Fenris tugs at it with urgent fingers, breathing hard and ragged. The fabric nearly gives under his fingers, but the last few threads resist him, and Hawke finally, gracelessly pulls them away.

Fenris throws back his head as she eases down, squeezing his eyes shut and his throat vibrating with a silent cry. Hawke barely sees it, too dizzy with heat and desire as she settles against his hips, but his face is clear as the light falling over the bed as she begins to move.

The only trouble with this particular path, she thinks, before her mind dissolves into a summer-haze of pleasure, is that it's difficult to kiss Fenris, and keep her movements steady. But she can't think of a worthier goal, not to save her life, so she bends down cradling his face in her hands, murmuring nonsense and his name, and when she begins to lose her rhythm, his hands guide her, keep her slow and sure, as the light takes them both.

* * *

Hawke wakes once, when some small sound breaks her sleep and leaves her blinking into the dark.

"Is it you, love?" she whispers, when she hears the sound again. Footsteps, light and quick; Fenris has gone for a drink of water, or perhaps to shut yet one more window she forgot. "Fenris?"

No answer comes. Hawke sits up, fighting the sheets tangled around her legs, and finds Fenris lying on his side, watching her with eyes like green lightning.

"Fenris?" she asks again, and reaches for him. He doesn't reach back.

 _What's wrong_ would have been the next words out of her mouth, but a cruel, steel-armored hand crushes her wrist in its grip and pulls her backwards.

Fenris watches, unmoving and uninterested, as the little bones in Hawke's wrist groan and begin to break, and another hand claps over her mouth to trap her cry.

In her house — it doesn't matter. She has her mana now, she can fight — but when she calls to her magic, it does not answer. She's a dry seashell again, and the air around her face crackles hot and white.

"It is better this way," says Meredith, against her ear. "Sooner or later, this would be your end. Don't fight, Champion. Your time is over."

Hawke ignores the pain in her wrist, uses her legs to throw herself backward against the solid weight at her back. If Meredith stumbles for just a moment, she can break free. She will not die like this, like an unwanted kitten, breathless and mewling. All she needs is one spark, one mote of power.

Meredith sighs. "You will fight," she says, her voice almost sad, almost gentle. "You will always fight."

 _Damn bloody right I will,_ Hawke thinks, and lunges again. Fenris' eyes flicker as she moves, though he makes no move to help. She'll worry about that later, when she can breathe and think, when she's broken the unyielding hold the knight-commander has upon her.

Hawke wrests one arm free and claws over her head — the eyes, always go for the eyes, Meredith is just as weak there as any other — but she freezes mid-reach as her hand passes through her dimming vision.

"You see," says Meredith, as Fenris makes a quiet choking sound on his side of the bed. "I only do what must be done."

Her grip tightens, but Hawke barely feels it. Every thought and every spark of awareness left to her is fixed on her hand, where the skin stretches and then splits open. The cracks are wide and bloodless, but the sharp peaks of barnacles are clear enough, as Hawke's vision is filled with grey mist.

Fenris is calling her name, she realizes, as she surfaces into her dim, curtained room. And his hands are on her shoulders, shaking her gently but insistently, and he sighs, relieved, when she opens her eyes.

Hawke shrinks from his touch — she can't reconcile this Fenris, warm and kind and fierce, with the blank-faced, choking echo she faced in her dream. He lets go like he's been scalded, and then waits, brows drawn low, for her to speak.

She breathes, slowly, searching for the words. "A nightmare," she says at last, barely able to hear herself over the rush of blood in her ears. Her body feels so bloody heavy, as if all her bones have turned to lead, but at least nothing _hurts_ , not even her wrist, though the sensation of Meredith's steel grip lingers.

Fenris nods, his face clearing a little. "You cried out," he says, "and fought."

"Yes, I suppose I did." Hawke sits up and pushes her hair from her face. The light stealing in through her curtains tells her it's not yet sunset. How long did her little peace last? Fewer hours than she has fingers.

At first she feels resignation — _Of course it couldn't last_ — and then something hard and sharp as a broken bone lodges in her throat. She's had her fill of terror and helplessness; like her tears, their time is over. Now she feels _wrath_ , like a flaming sword where her heart used to be.

It should have lasted. It should never have been broken to begin with. But now she doubts her own mind and reflection, not even her house is safe from nightmares, whether she's waking or sleeping — and she is _finished_ with it all.

Her hand falls into her lap, and she can't help running her fingers along the bones of her wrist and knuckles, half-ready to find fresh sharp edges waiting under the skin, ready to burst free. What a strange relief, to have finally dreamed of something more terrifying than death at Meredith's hands.

The blood still rushes in her ears, though her heart has already slowed to its normal beat. Oh, but it's not blood at all, she knows it's not — it's the sea, cresting and falling again and again, its mouthless voice surging toward her.

Hawke presses her fists to her temples. It hurts to breathe, with her chest so tight and her head pulsing with not just the sea but with that thorny knot of anger, but she inhales, till her ribs ache, and turns to Fenris.

"Do you hear that, Fenris?" she asks. "The sea? It's here. It's —" Another surge of anger, bright and brittle, shears away the rest of her sentence.

He doesn't speak, but he gathers her against his chest and rests his head on top of hers. Hawke shuts her eyes, wills the sound away, but the sea's call remains. It can wait. It can afford patience.

* * *

 **AN:** Many, many thanks to tetrahedrals for her wonderful beta-reading!


	9. Chapter 9

Previously: Hawke found peace (and a bit more) with Fenris after her confession, though another nightmare about Meredith — and the return of the sea's voice — left her more shaken than ever.

And in the present, a near-miss with a patrolling templar reminds Orsino just how dangerous it is to host this particular guest in his office. Hawke, however, seemed unconcerned.

Onward…

* * *

The Champion runs her fingers along the edge of her cloak, so artless a movement Orsino assumes she's spent hours perfecting it. "Sleep was a little hard to find after that, as you might imagine," she says, her eyes following her fingers' path. "It's quite absorbing, losing one's mind. Not much room for anything else."

Orsino gives her a tiny nod that says _of course, of course, please continue, I'm hanging on every word you say_ , even as he boils with impatience. Confession or not, he wishes she would get to her bloody point and then leave him to the rain-soaked quiet. His nerves haven't settled from Franklin's surprise visit — Maker be praised it wasn't Rosemary who came along, or Stanchen, though he knows in his bones his luck won't hold. Hawke's favor may be the city's most prized coin, but there are some things he won't risk to gain it.

 _Really, Orsino_ , he thinks, holding back a bitter laugh. _Lie to everyone else, but you can't deceive yourself._

Hawke smooths her hair back from her temples, frowning a little, but her expression isn't what draws Orsino's attention: it's her arms, laid bare to the candlelight as her cloak and sleeves fall back. Her knuckles are raw and red, and long scratches, some nearly-faded and some so fresh they might still be bleeding, run from her wrists to her elbows. They look, he thinks, like claw marks.

He draws a deep breath and pushes out his awareness to test the air around her. All magic acts upon the world, to one degree or another, and the scope of the magic worked is only the beginning. The simple existence of a mage is enough to gather energies, like moths to flame or flies to refuse. Potential, or audacity, are as large a part of the attraction as ability.

There have been mages who warp the world around them, whose magic Orsino still tastes on the back of his tongue: Malcolm Hawke, juniper and sage; First Enchanter Maceron, ice-bitten wind; the Warden-Commander, blood and bitter rue and steel.

Maud, long burned to ash: fire, and nothing else.

Death erases no mage or magic. They erode, over lifetimes. One only needs to walk through the streets of Kirkwall to feel the places where the walls tremble still with latent grief and fury. If the right pressure were to be applied, with the right incantations, who's to say what wouldn't be awakened, to rule the city once again?

Dangerous thoughts. Seductive. Has Hawke fallen prey to temptation? She's rejected blood magic at every opportunity, at the top of her lungs, and Orsino would bet his life that's half the reason why she still walks free — but the room shudders around her, ripples of power without finesse, and some of the marks on her arms go very, very deep.

What part of Kirkwall would awaken, if the Champion called to it with blood?

He inhales again, opens his mind and body to Hawke's magic, and senses only the stirrings of a formidable mage's power, and the smell of honey and salt. Sweet and bitter, a welcome and a refusal. There is no blood magic within her, only the steady beat of her heart.

Orsino withdraws into himself, ignoring the awkward mix of feelings greeting his lack of discovery. Nothing so petty as _disappointment_ , of course. Simply confusion and impatience.

Hawke lets her hands fall back to her lap in a tumble of dark wool. Now her hands simply look like mages' hands, dextrous and rough and clever.

"I came here to ask you about the dream-sea," she says, her gaze moving past his shoulder and to the bookshelves behind his desk. "And this seems a good moment to ask again. You've heard half the story, First Enchanter. Now it's your turn to tell a tale. What is the dream-sea?"

There is no prohibition against speaking of it, nor against its study, but only because so few know of its existence. If someone hears of the dream-sea, it's a rhyme in an old song, and few are curious enough to investigate further.

How lucky for the Champion he was one of the few.

Orsino reaches for the brandy. It's truly foul, a liquor for only the truly desperate, but he takes two full swallows before setting the bottle aside. Hawke raises her brows, a wry smile ghosting across her face, and Orsino almost smiles back.

"The dream-sea," he says, once the urge to cough has departed, "is old magic, Champion. Not so much a place but an echo of the sea that touched these shores, long before Tevinter ruled here. A sea-that-was."

He pauses, but Hawke only nods once, her hands in her lap and her eyes on his face. If only his students were so attentive.

"Many have speculated on the city's design and its purpose, but few would argue Kirkwall was built to augment the magisters' magic. The Gallows itself —" Orsino catches himself, shakes his head. "Forgive me. It seems I can't help lecturing."

"I did ask," says Hawke, smooth as a summer breeze. "And all information is useful. Please, go on." Her hands are clenched into fists.

"As you like." The taste of the brandy lingers in his mouth, growing ever-more rancid. "In those days, Kirkwall was known as Emerius, and —"

No, _no_. There is no need for history here, no need for context. Both of them know what Kirkwall was. Kirkwall is a rank pit, its sides slick with blood old and new, and those who died here still cry out in the dark. The city has not changed in all the ages of the world. It is old, it is vicious, and its cruelty will never end.

"All that lives leaves an echo in the Fade," he begins. "All — Champion?"

She shakes her head, her absent smile disappearing. "It's nothing. You reminded me of something a friend told me, that's all. Please."

"Beast, man, elf, dwarf, our qunari brethren, even those who lie beyond the Boeric Sea — all may be found there, in the Fade, however faint or changed. The sea is no different."

Hawke doesn't move. Only two candles still burn, casting her into near-shadow, draining all color from her face and eyes.

"I've heard it said at its heart lies the Black City, but I've glimpsed the sea far from the horizon. Its shores appear, a flicker at the edge of one's vision, and gone again. But once seen, you can still…sense it, no matter how far in the Fade you travel." Orsino pauses again, his mind drifting briefly from Hawke, his room, the chill and silent Gallows all around them, to his memory of the sea, glinting in the corner of his eye, and the heavy, cool smell of salt.

If mages curve the world, and the strongest warp it, the dream-sea drowns it. Such potential, like all the storms of history in the moment before their breaking — the sea remembers every shore, every ship, every creature gliding through its depths. If one could leash such power — well. Such thoughts are why the Golden City is now blackened, and forever tainted.

But who can control the sea? What ambition, what will, would be required?

"It's said the sea sometimes reaches our world through tears in the Veil — water flows where it will, here and in the Fade — and if one can reach such a tear, then one can lay claim to great power. If," he says, leaning forward, listening beyond his office for approaching footsteps, "one pleases what lives within the sea."

The unasked question shimmers between them. Let her ask. Let her be the one in need. The coin is in his reach. Just a little longer.

Hawke closes her eyes. "No need for suspense, First Enchanter," she says, almost a whisper. Her hand presses to her breastbone, and her heartbeat echoes again in his ears. "I'll play. What is their name?"

"You don't need one, Champion. Not when you've seen them." Orsino sits back in his chair, allows himself one smug moment when her eyes open, cold as lyrium.

"A fair point," she says, her heartbeat picking up. "Tell me, then. How does one please such creatures?"

"Again, this is all hearsay and rumor, but — sacrifice." He gives Hawke a thin, humorless smile. "What else would something born from this place want? The city only knows how to take, Champion."

She smiles back. In the dying light, her skin has all the texture and color of old wax. There are too many teeth in that smile, and they are all far too sharp. The scars on her face look more like cracks in porcelain than marks on flesh. There are day-old corpses that look more alive than Hawke, but still she smiles, like a hole in the world.

"Those might be the truest words ever spoken," she says, without losing her smile. "Now, tell me — if there was a tear large enough, if this dream-sea were to return — what would happen to Kirkwall then?"

"You're asking me to predict —"

"It's rhetorical, First Enchanter." Her hand closes tight over her breastbone, and the gold chain about her neck catches the last of the light. Orsino rises to light another few candles, but even across the room he still hears the noise of Hawke's heart battering at her ribs. The sound even smothers his own pulse, the throbbing filling the room, drowning out the rain and the scrape of air in his lungs.

No human heart should make such a sound.

His hand fumbles as he tries to draw mana and flame to the wick. So heavy the sound, so frail the body; he turns back to find Hawke watching him, her hand still closed and the chain still glowing.

"What have you brought here?" he manages, his voice squeezing through a tight, near-crushed throat. "Champion —"

"Don't be afraid," she says, her eyes cast downward. "It will be all right."

 _How dare you speak to me so_? he tries to snarl, but his voice won't obey. "Hawke," is all he can manage.

"Soon," she whispers, "just a little longer. I have to know. Please."

The beat swells, furious, heavy enough to bend Orsino's back, and then it fades, as sullen as a child, until only the memory of its pressure remains.

He staggers back to his chair, candles forgotten. "What have you brought here?" he hisses at Hawke, teeth gritted. "If you risk the mages —"

"They're safe," she says, eyes rising to his. The light of the damned shines within them once more. "I swear on my life, and all I love, I've brought no harm to your mages. Maker strike me down if I lie."

Orsino holds her gaze for a long moment, breathing hard, then finally nods. Whatever else is said about her, the Champion has never broken a vow. He can trust her.

 _But she can't trust me_ , he thinks, a flash of guilt arcing through him. It's gone in an instant.

"I get the sense I haven't told you anything you don't already know," he says, when his voice is steady once more. "So why come to me at all? Why the risk?"

"I have to be sure, for what comes next." At his frown, Hawke smiles again — a woman once more, tired and lovely — draws the chain over her head, and lets it pool in her palm. She holds out her hand to him. "What do you see, First Enchanter?"

He sees a round locket, its latch throw open, and nestled within —

"A pearl," he says. "Nothing more."

Hawke keeps smiling. "As you should." Her hand closes around chain, locket, and pearl, and after a moment of hesitation, she drops the chain over her head and tucks the locket under her cloak. "The dream-sea," she prompts.

Orsino starts, then sits up straight in his chair. "The dream-sea. Yes. Some — again, from what I have heard, and from the little I've read — some have tried to capture its power. But for that, they would need a truly worthy sacrifice. One worth an ocean."

He stops, heart cold in his chest. "Like a city," he finishes, gaze locked to Hawke's. His lips are numb, his hands ache. "Champion —"

"Like a city," she says. "Shall I finish my story, Orsino?"

He pauses only a moment, long enough to shake the worst of the chill winding along his nerves, then hands her the bottle. She shakes her head, which only makes the chill sharper. What comes next?

"I couldn't sleep, not with that in my ears," says Hawke. Slowly, as if she herself isn't aware of it, she traces the scars on her cheek, pressing with her nails, then exhales long and slow. "I tried, but — even a little fool like me knows a breaking point when I meet one. So, I went for a walk. With Fenris, this time," she adds, a smile of aching sweetness crossing her face. "We would face it all together, as he said."

"And where did you go?" Orsino asks, as her smile melts away.

"Where else could we go, but down to where the city meets the sea?"

* * *

If all were as it should be, Hawke would stay in bed with Fenris' arm firm about her waist and his breath warm on the back of her neck until the day the sun failed to rise. If all were as it should be, she would watch the slow progression of the moon through holes in the clouds and keep her feet tucked between his ankles. Even if she couldn't sleep, she could still find rest.

If all were — but it isn't. The rattle in Fenris' chest has lessened, but not disappeared, and the guilty whispers in Hawke's head tell her he's far more in need of sleep than she is of comfort. After all, he has nearly a decade of vigils behind him; she has no right to take more.

She slides out of the circle of his arm, and he marks her passage with only a quiet sigh and by burying his head in the pillows. Hawke smiles in the dark, amazed once more by the vast weight of her love for him, and feels her nightmare begin to loosen its grip. The temptation to check her palm and make sure the skin there remains unbroken is too great to resist, but Hawke keeps herself to a glance, and then refuses to look again.

It was a dream, nothing more. She's not so mad yet she can't tell the difference — though the sea swells in her ears, with knowing laughter.

She ignores it all the way down to the kitchen, listening to her house for signs anyone else has risen. All is quiet, without even a crier to call down the hour, and after her dark and silent trip through the house, Hawke nearly jumps out of her skin when she opens the door to the kitchen and finds the fire blazing, with Merrill and a pile of books at the table.

Of all the people she wants to meet — and oh, she feels like a shit for thinking so, because it's _Merrill_ , sweet and loyal as ever — Merrill is the last on the list. Sweet and loyal as she is and ever will be, she sees too much, and that makes her dangerous. Especially now, when Hawke can't tell the difference between her own racing heart and the voice of the sea.

"What — uh, hello," she says, hovering awkwardly on the threshold. "You're up early."

Merrill gives her a smile far too bright for the abominable hour, though her nose is red and sore. "Oh, no, not at all, I haven't gone to sleep yet. I tried to, but I coughed so badly I couldn't close my eyes, so I came here for a bit of tea — and I raided your workroom, I hope you don't mind, your poultices are so helpful — and then I just started reading, and — Hawke, are you all right?"

"I don't know how to answer that," Hawke says without thinking, trailing half a sentence behind Merrill, as she nearly always does. When Merrill's eyebrows pinch together, she hefts a smile on her face and waves her words away. "I'm well enough, Merrill, don't let me interrupt your studying." She's nearly out the door again when Merrill coughs.

"You don't have to leave, Hawke," she says, once her throat is clear. Hawke looks over her shoulder, and finds Merrill turning a page, cool as you please. "I'm not going to ask about it if you don't want me to."

"Oh, bloody — shit." Hawke presses her hands to her cheeks, relieved when a faint ache rewards her touch, and guilty over being so relieved. The guilt doesn't stop her from pressing harder against the scars. or from her relief taking a triumphant edge when the sea's whispers draw back. "You being so insightful really ruins my sly escape, you know."

"It would have been a very good escape," Merrill assures her, with another turn of a page. "But it's very hard not to notice when someone is trying to _not_ talk about something." There's no reproach in her voice or expression, but just like Fenris' utter lack of anger, the absence is the harshest rebuke of all.

Hawke claims her usual stool and reaches across the table to take Merrill's hand in hers. As she does, a memory flashes past her mind's eye: Bethany's slim hand, pushing a bowl toward her. She shoves the image away, quick as she can. Merrill is not Bethany, even if she squeezes Hawke's hand just as Bethany used to do.

Grief is like walking down an old, ill-cared-for street and catching your foot on a loose stone; you know it's a possibility, and watch your step, but sometimes you stumble, and sometimes you're flat on your face, every inch of your body bruised from the fall. Hawke flinches as Merrill's hand tightens: Bethany is dead, just like Mother. They are not coming back.

The offered bowl didn't come from them, but her refusal still feels like a betrayal.

 _And really, would I want them to see me like this? Half-mad, jumping at nightmares, jabbing at myself just to make sure I'm awake? I could hardly bear Fenris knowing._

Such selfishness. Is her pride really worth so much?

She squeezes Merrill's hand back, a little amazed her eyes are still dry. Her tears have truly fled. "I'm sorry, Merrill."

"Don't be." Merrill peers at Hawke through a sheaf of dark hair, sniffling all the while. The poultice's smell hangs heavy around her; she wheezes with every breath. "I'm glad you asked for my help, even if there wasn't anything there in the end. And isn't that for the best, instead of there really being blood magic there?"

Impossible to miss the hard twist in Merrill's voice, or the way she lifts her chin as she speaks. Hawke bristles, because there are only two people who ever make Merrill around like that, and if they've been needling her under Hawke's roof, they _will_ regret it. She'll never love or trust blood magic, but she loves Merrill with her whole heart, and in her house, there will be no baiting. "Has someone said —"

"Oh, no, but they're thinking it, even if they don't know they're thinking it." Merrill coughs into her fist and reaches between two towers of books for her mug of tea. "Can I say one thing, about — it?"

Hawke's throat is very dry. She swallows twice before she nods. "Of course."

"I can't believe I didn't think of it before, when you told me what you felt, and — well, everything has an echo, here or in the Fade. Usually there, but Kirkwall, it's a very old city, isn't it? And not a very nice one."

The furrows running along the sewers, the chains in the harbor. The Gallows, and the cells where the weeping never stops. Hawke nods.

"Everything dies, but sometimes it takes a very, very long time. And even if something stays alive, it can get very quiet. Very soft." Merrill coughs again, scrabbles in her pocket for a handkerchief, and coughs until her eyes water. Hawke fetches her a cup of water, ignoring the cold prickle on the back of her neck, and rubs Merrill's back until her cough is done. When Merrill reaches for her tea, Hawke brushes the bottom of the mug with her fingertips, and Merrill's poor sick face brightens as fresh steam rises from the surface.

"A little more every day," Hawke says, to the unasked question.

Merrill beams at her, then grows serious once more, her brows drawn low in a thoughtful frown.

"Sometimes, we feel echoes. In the Alienage — well." Merrill's mouth hardens. "There's power in Kirkwall, old and new. Maybe you felt that. Something very old, brushing up against you, and then slipping away."

Like the sea, always spilling up the harbor steps, greedy for Kirkwall's streets, only to be thwarted and fall back, ready to begin against at the changing of the tide.

The sea always returns. Who's to say something once found might not be found again? Perhaps the offered bowl isn't quite gone.

The room shivers and a distant susurrus surrounds them. She knots a hand in her nightdress, ready to pinch, but the kitchen settles into itself, just a warm, well-lit room smelling of bread and herbs. Hawke gives Merrill's hand another squeeze. "You know, I think you may have something there, Merrill."

She sets another kettle to boiling, and leaves a poultice jar on top of one of Merrill's book, then tiptoes back up the stairs.

Fenris wakes at her light touch, firefly eyes almost too bright in the dark room. "Hawke? I — is all well?"

"Well enough," she says, aware of the echo, and runs her fingers over his bandaged arm. "My love, I know it's early, but I think I need to go for a walk."

* * *

Hawke passes the qunari compound an hour later, arm in arm with Fenris. She shudders, and draws the furred collar of her cloak up about her cheeks. After three years, even with Kirkwall's seams forever on the verge of bursting, the compound still stands empty. It's impossible to look at its walls without thinking of Merrill's talk of echoes, and Hawke knows all too well what would ring through the great hollow space beyond the wooden gates. Blood magic is only one of Kirkwall's nightmares.

"They should just tear it down," she says, when it's safely behind them. "Or burn it. Start fresh."

Fenris makes an agreeable noise, then sneezes, then groans. Hawke digs the nails of her free hand into her palm; she's done quite well at ignoring her guilt over dragging him through the city up till now, but he's grown more miserable with every step they take into Kirkwall's black morning. He insisted on joining her, as she knew he would, as much as she hoped she could convince him otherwise.

 _I promised you_ , he'd said, as she protested and he tightened his vambraces, _you would not face this alone_.

If there is anything in Thedas or the Fade more immovable than Fenris with a vow, Hawke's imagination can't conjure it. She gave in gracefully as her guilt allowed, and only muttered once or twice about the stubbornness of handsome elves, and so now they walk, well-bundled and with their arms linked, through Kirkwall's streets.

"Do you have a destination?" he asks. "Is there…a sign, of some sort?"

Hawke exhales, shakes her head as her breath plumes about her then disappears. She'd hoped a little of that golden certainty would return if she just walked far enough, but her head is filled only with doubt, and guilt, and the memory of her nightmare. The urge to check her palms for barnacles lingers; no call or beacon tugs her forward.

 _Because why would it?_ she thinks, wry and resigned. _It's all up to me, now_. _Cheerful thought._

Strange to think all that came before was the easy part.

"Down to the water," she says, very aware of how ridiculous she sounds. "And…hopefully we'll find something there." _An echo. Preferably not a nasty one, though I'd bet every coin in my coffers Kirkwall doesn't have any other kind._ "As far as plans go, I know it's —"

"We've had far worse," Fenris says, drawing her onward when she would have paused. "The Duke's hunting party."

Hawke wraps her free hand around his arm. "Listening to Mother Petrice."

"Aveline's surprise birthday party."

"I object! That was misunderstood brilliance."

"Hawke," says Fenris, in the patient tones of a man doomed to being reasonable, "the evening began with her trading blows with the entertainment. And it ended —"

"The templars never proved it was me," Hawke interrupts, laughing. "And rightfully so, because we all know it was Merrill."

Fenris huffs a laugh of his own, and they walk on, in what seems to Hawke to be the only bright spot in the entire city. If not for the chill making the healed bones in her face ache, she could pretend this was a thousand other walks to the Hanged Man or the markets. Walks that didn't end in a welter of blood and horror, or a mystery that may or may not exist. Just a walk, with the man she loves, toward somewhere warm and familiar.

It will be that again. Mad or not, mystery or not, each step she takes is one toward reclaiming the city.

With that thought to buoy her steps, they make good time, and reach the boundary between Lowtown and the docks a quarter-hour later — a boundary not marked by words or signs but by the sudden overwhelming odor of fish.

Fenris grumbles and hunches into his cloak. " _Fish_ ," he says. Hawke has to turn her head to hide her smile. Her mind may crumble, the city may descend into chaos, but the sun will persist in rising, and Fenris will hate fish. Thank the Maker for little constants.

"We'll be quick," she promises, steering them down a long flight of stairs. The slap of the water frothing at the docks finally buries the phantom voice of the sea, and a knot in her back loosens. "Well," she amends, when Fenris quirks one brow at her, his mouth a rueful line, "as quick as we can be."

The water reflects the slivered moon as it peers furtively through the clouds. Here, the air is not simply chilled but heavy with salt, and Hawke pinches her thigh every other step to keep herself placed on the dock beneath her feet. After so long finding the sea in her home and in her ears, it seems almost extraordinary to find it lapping at the stone and wood.

She lets go of Fenris' arm when they reach the halfway point, and walks to the end of the dock alone. A few lonely ships are anchored far out in the harbor, just before the great chains, but they are silent, their lanterns doused, and all the buildings behind her are quiet as corpses.

Hawke opens her arms to the sea and draws a deep singer's breath. "I'm here," she calls, feeling more foolish than she has in ages, trying not to imagine someone looking out their window and seeing the Champion talking to a great deal of dirty water. "I'm listening. Whatever you wanted me to know — I'm here."

Deep in the city, the crier calls four in the morning. Fenris is notable only for his utter silence. Below Hawke, a broken glass jar floats by, surrounded by dirty straw.

This water carries no power, only trash and sickly fish. Hawke lets her arms fall to her sides, embarrassed and prickling with annoyance. If she wanted to call to power, better to go to the Wounded Coast, where the water was as wild as it was cold, and scream into the salt-wind as it tried to burn the skin off her cheeks.

She counts ten silent minutes before turning around, ready to apologize to Fenris for her fool's errand — really, what _was_ she thinking? Nothing at all, as always. "This was — this was a mistake, I'm sorry," she says, dragging her hands through her hair and wincing as they catch in tangles. "I don't know why I thought — why anything would —"

"Hawke."

She looks up to find him watching her with the strangest frown. "What is it?"

"I'd argue this is no mistake," he says, voice slow and uncertain, and points.

Hawke turns, the sea and her heartbeat rising in her ears, to find a steadily-growing circle of clear water appearing at the end of the dock. All the refuse is fleeing from the center, though nothing ripples the water.

"Oh," she says, and sinks to her knees. There's still no beacon, no certainty, but something is rising from the water, quick and slender as an arrow, and when the fish-woman's face breaks the surface, Hawke almost cries from relief.

" _Hawke_ ," says the fish-woman, baring clear needle-teeth in what might be a smile. She holds out a dead-pale hand, and waits.

Hawke glances over her shoulder at Fenris, who watches with his mouth open in a small _o_ , and then takes the fish-woman's hand in hers.

The fish-woman's skin is soft and slippery as the skin of a plum; Hawke could split her visitor open with a careless fingernail. She doesn't move, merely breathes and considers the creature floating before the dock, with her noseless face and thick gills fluttering at her neck.

"Hawke," says the fish-woman. " _Hawke._ Didn't listen." Her voice scrapes and stutters out of a throat not built for catching air.

"I'm sorry," Hawke says, ashamed of herself and all too aware of Fenris' eyes on her back. "I should have —"

"A cost, now. Quickly, Hawke." Through the hand gripping hers, Hawke feels a tremor, growing ever-stronger. A cost — of course: the clean circle rippling outward from the fish-woman's body, breathing air instead of water. Always a price to be paid for such journeys. " _Quickly_ ," says the fish-woman, her fingers squeezing tight and her claws — nothing soft there — cutting into Hawke's hand.

Hawke stifles a gasp, sick relief welling in her belly from the pain. This is real, then; her mind hasn't spat out another nightmare of steel and salt. In the water below, the fish-woman smiles.

"Trust it," she says. "Pain. Yes." With a great heaving thrash of her tail, she hefts herself out of the water and onto the dock. On reflex, Hawke throws out her free arm to pull her up, astonished at the unexpected weight of the strange cold body that lands against her. Fenris curses, but comes no closer as the fish-woman clings to Hawke and presses their foreheads together. She grips Hawke's wrists, tight enough to make the bones sing in misery. Trails of heat flow over Hawke's skin as the fish-woman's nails tear careless strips out of her arm.

This close, the smell of wet rot is overwhelming. Tangled in the fish-woman's hair are old seashells, some with still-living residents, their claws moving carefully in the thick strands. Spurs of bone pierce the fish-woman's skin to gleam in the faint light, and her eyes are dark as inkpots about to spill over.

Hawke stares back, afraid, and quite aware of what might happen if she shows it. All the old stories say the same thing: fear is a favored garnish, weakness an invitation to feast, and she is the one bleeding "Tell me," she says, fighting to keep her eyes focused away from those needle teeth, "what you want me to do."

The fish-woman licks her teeth with a grey tongue, blinks lashless eyes. "A child," she says, her voice thinning, a jagged, miserable whisper. "Lost and sleeping. Rescue the child, Hawke. Girl-child, young and weak. Sleeping."

Lady Aix wailing in the Chantry, about her daughter who would not wake. The grief in her voice is echoed in the fish-woman's now, a loss with no end, and hardly any hope. At last, her clear golden purpose has returned, and she forgets the pain in her arms in her weak-kneed relief. "I'll go," Hawke promises, her mind skipping ahead to where she knocks on Lady Aix's door, and the excuses she'll need to be brought inside. "I swear to you. Whatever has her, I'll—"

Another, brighter flash of pain as the fish-woman's claws cut deeper. "No. No. _Listen,_ Hawke. Other sisters — gone. Missing. Cut apart. Beware a golden woman." Her voice splinters into a growl on the last two words. "Gold of hair and eye. Bright. Hot. Like you."

Hawke shuts her mouth on all the questions rising up her throat. Would drinking from the bowl have made this any clearer — a golden woman like her, and missing sisters? Perhaps, though that chance is lost forever.

She will, as always, work with the tools at hand.

"How do I save the child — wake her?" she asks, as the fish-woman's breath grows shallow. "What do I do then? Is there a spell, some kind of curse?"

The fish-woman makes no reply, only closes a hand into a fist and presses it to her chest. _Keep her safe_.

"And this golden woman," Hawke says, nearly babbling, as the fish-woman begins to gasp and her gills flutter impotently. "Who is she? What is she doing in Kirkwall?"

"Breaking," says the fish-woman, her voice a growl once more. "Breaking _everything_. All is connected, all will fall. She calls the sea, Hawke. She wants the city. Save the child, and bring her here. Call for _Beyân_. I will come."

She clings to Hawke a moment longer, chest heaving, clawed fingers clutching at Hawke's neck and wrists and sides, then falls back toward the water, the moon casting high pale light across her narrow chest.

Hawke staggers away from the wave of filthy water, and finds Fenris ready to catch her should she lose her balance. Below them, the clear water is gone, only refuse and grey film in its place, and if the fish-woman's silver form flees into the depths of the harbor, Hawke can't see it.

She aches from a dozen claw marks, and the cold water has soaked through her clothes. Fenris speaks her name, his mouth close to her ear, but her heartbeat drowns out his voice.

When she has her breath back, she turns in his arms and drinks in his face: fierce, bewildered, beloved. He gives the bloody marks on her arms a dark look, but she savors them, as proof she can carry with her for hours.

"To Lady Aix, then," she says, and the sea's voice fills her with what could almost be joy.


	10. Chapter 10

**Previously** : The truth of the dream-sea is revealed, and Orsino finally begins to understand the magnitude of what Hawke has brought to his door. Merrill and Hawke talk about — or around — Kirkwall's long and bloody shadows, and Fenris finally meets Hawke's madness face-to-face.

Onward…

* * *

Fenris spends most of the walk back to Hawke's mansion in abstracted silence. Hawke doesn't blame him one bit; if their positions had been reversed, she'd probably still be gaping at the dirty water. Silence, for Fenris, is almost as natural as stillness; by now, Hawke knows better than to try pulling him back when he withdraws from her so. There are rooms within himself he is still learning, a vast interior long stolen and obscured, and only recently returned. She has no right to them until he chooses to share them — though she misses him, when he goes.

It makes for a lonely journey home, despite how tightly he clasps her hand. They reach the Hightown markets, bare as a plucked chicken for the night, before he makes a thoughtful sound and rolls his shoulders.

"That was —" he begins. Hawke waits, running her fingertips over the fresh scratches on her arm. There's been no hint of the sea since they left the docks, which she takes to mean it's pleased with her, for once, but better safe than sorry. "I'm not sure what that was, Hawke."

"She's getting better all the time at telling me what she needs me to know." Hawke rubs her eyes. There's no telling what time it is without a crier, but it must be close to dawn. The bakery is aglow with golden light, warm yeasty smells tangled with the toasty scent of the chestnut seller's first batch. "That was clarity itself, by comparison."

Fenris makes his usual indistinct noise. In spite of her weariness, the cold, and her various aches' plaintive chorus, Hawke laughs. There could be a hundred rooms within him, a thousand, and she would still know that noise anywhere in the world.

He squeezes her hand. "I take it your newfound clarity is helping you form a plan?"

"It's not much of one," she says, which she has said countless times in her life and will say countless more. Fenris outright snorts, being almost as familiar with those words as she is, and a warm spot blossoms in her chest, closer to the bakery's warmth than the great certainty she longed for, but far steadier. "I must see Margery. Which means getting past Lady Aix, and —"

She lets the sentence trail away as they pass into the square. The comforting bulk of her estate looms ahead, an Orana-shaped shadow opening the curtains on the second floor. Her heart lightens at the thought of walking through the front door, but an ugly truth lingers at the end of her abandoned sentence. Kirkwall is, almost despite itself, quite beautiful at first glance, or if one doesn't bother to look beyond Hightown and the Chantry's benevolent shadow. But turn it over, like a rock in a garden, and one ends up with a handful of dark, slimy things, writhing in the light.

Even by Hawke's standards — which have lessened or grown a great deal since knowing Varric, depending on one's perspective — that's a horribly overwrought metaphor, and she's trying to banish the mental image when Fenris speaks.

"You should take Nettle with you," he says, his voice a study in neutrality.

Hawke nods. A sour taste fills her throat, one that won't be banished by pain or by words. There are doors in this city that will always be closed, places where he cannot come with her, and nothing she can say will change it, or make it better.

The sight of Fenris fishing out his own key and fitting it into the lock without a bit of hesitation lessens the worst of the roiling in her belly. This is his home as much as hers.

"I'll go first thing," she says. "You'll barely notice we're gone."

Fenris gives her an eloquent look that communicates exasperation and fondness in a single glance, and pushes open the door.

* * *

The qunari invasion left more than their old compound empty. Hawke counts five vacant mansions on her walk through Hightown, mouldering in quiet dignity — six, if she were to count Fenris' mansion, where only three of twenty-nine rooms are habitable. With their owners either slaughtered or decamped to cities less inclined toward disaster, and any heirs either lost or unwilling to take their chances in Kirkwall, the estates will continue to moulder, until someone buys them up or Seneschal Bran claims the property for the city and tears it all down.

 _Or_ , Hawke thinks, stepping around a stretch of mud as Nettle happily skips through it, _until I muck up everything, and the sea comes to claim Kirkwall for itself_.

That lovely thought carries her past another two empty mansions before she reaches the edge of Lady Aix's estate. The guards at the gate cross spears at her approach, and she turns her third-brightest smile upon them. She knows mercenaries by sight, having been a rather successful one herself for more than a few years now. Something in the eyes, a never-ending calculation, or perhaps weariness.

A deep singer's breath. Then: "I come to call on Lady Aix. Is she at home?"

One of the few lovely things about being Champion is how ill-defined the actual position is; one can safely assume a Champion protects and defends, regardless of what they're Champion of, but after that things become rather murky. Hawke keeps her smile in place while the mercenaries — no, _guards_ — toss glances back and forth, and gives them nothing.

Doubtless the lion's share of their confusion comes from her dress; she left the Champion's armor at home on its stand, and chose a cobalt wool dress instead. Black leather boots and gloves, a red-black cloak, all her paints and colors in place, no staff or armor in sight. Only the red-painted mabari nosing at some weeds is a reminder of who she is, but no one would risk the Champion's anger by refusing her entry.

Just in case, Hawke turns her third-best smile into her second, and watches the guards recoil. Ah, excellent. She's fought someone they know. That makes things easier.

"Lady Aix is home," says the younger guard, warily but politely. Her partner keeps cutting her glances under his visor, and shuffling his feet. Skittish. Liable to make mistakes. Hawke ignores him and keeps smiling at the first guard. "But she is indisposed, Champion. I'd be happy to send a message —"

"No need, serah." Hawke steps forward, tilts up her chin. The first guard jumps to push the gate open for her. Nettle trots through first, head high. "I'll be quick."

They whisper, the guards, as they close the gate behind her. The news will be all around the city by noontime: the Champion walking the streets alone, bold as you please, with her mabari by her side. By nightfall, even the Gallows will have heard, and Meredith —

 _Focus_ , Hawke tells herself, before the memory of her nightmare can take hold. _This is no time to be distracted._

But the nightmare is persistent, and when she next inhales she smells salt, and the milky sunlight about her seems to dim. She still has half the garden to walk before she reaches the estate doors, and no doubt the guards are watching her instead of the street. If her careful bearing slips, if even a scrap of madness shows, that too will be around the city by noon.

Hawke closes her eyes, then draws her nails, sharp and quick, over the barely-scabbed gouges circling her wrist. The pain runs through her like lightning, and when she opens her eyes once more, the light is calm and white, and the air about her smells of fresh-tilled earth. Nettle looks back, ears flat, and whines once.

Trust the pain, Beyân told her, not five hours ago. And so Hawke does — and not just trusts it, but relishes it, fiercely delighted by how it asserts itself over the dank, shadowed world of the sea.

 _I'd cut off a finger if it meant this would last_ , she thinks, as she passes into the inner courtyard.

The gardens, though still bare from their recent liberation from winter, thrum with latent growth. It gave the impression, however faintly, if Hawke turned her head fast enough, she would see the first bud unfolding. By contrast, the courtyard is static as one of the Chantry frescoes. No one guards the entryway here, and Hawke doesn't fault the breach in security; she wouldn't want to face this, or worse, keep it at her back. Two torches burn at the far end of the courtyard, on either side of the estate doors, though many more stand unlit and cold.

Why take care of the garden so meticulously, but leave this in cold darkness? The simplest answer, and the most likely, is one Hawke's quite familiar with: camouflage. The guards at the gate, turning back all visitors — _or gawkers_ , she thinks, a little acidly _—_ with a well-cared-for garden behind them. It projects control, a fortress assailed but unbroken. Hardship, but not grief. The inner courtyard tells the truth.

Over Hawke's head, a vast silvery net supports a mass of vines, and long tendrils spiral down, almost close enough to touch. Little light passes through the dense green carpet, but she hears the rustle of small creatures passing unseen through the leaves, and when her eyes adjust to the gloom, she sees tiny black blossoms at the tip of every vine.

She stands on tiptoes to test a blossom's scent, and a heavy musk greets her nose. The courtyard air is thick as wool, and damp, and in the lack of light every movement seems half-dreamed. Hawke's hands, when she tugs off her gloves, are tinted mottled green. Nettle's markings are black as soot.

Like a dream, or like drowning.

Hawke pulls back her hand as the front door opens, and Lady Aix herself steps out, alone. The skin of her face has gone loose along the jaw and under the chin. Her hair is scraped back in an indifferent knot, and she hasn't changed her dress since Hawke saw her at the Chantry.

"They started growing the day Margery didn't wake up." All the bell-like clarity has gone out of the woman's voice. "Black fucking flowers. I didn't notice them at first, I was too busy keeping watching — but they're the only things blooming." She turns a dim gaze on Hawke's face. "You ever heard of such a thing, Champion?"

There's a sneer buried under the word Hawke chooses to ignore, since it's the only sign of real life the woman's shown since she appeared. "Not once," she says, taking a few more steps, ready to spring for the door if Lady Aix decides to slam it in her face. "But I make no pretenses I'm a particularly knowledgable woman."

Lady Aix's top lip curls. "So I've heard." She turns her head. The movement loosens a few lank strands of greying hair, and sends them tumbling past her shoulders. Hawke has a vivid mental image of all the mad wives in her mother's favorite novels, and holds her breath against the inevitable pang in her chest. "Mya — Lady Ghent said you wouldn't come," she goes on, reaching for one of the black flowers herself. "Said you were too busy licking your wounds, or getting them licked, to care what went on in the city. I told her you'd come. Sooner or later. Didn't think it'd be this damn later, Champion."

Nettle growls, a thin line of fur standing up along her spine. Hawke quiets her with a hand upon the mabari's blocky head. She's heard a thousand times worse. Besides — it isn't as if Lady Aix is wrong, is it?

"Well." Lady Aix plucks the flower loose, and crushes in in her hand. A thick, spicy smell rises from the broken petals, and Hawke's mouth abruptly waters. "Better late than never. Come on." She drops the petals on the steps, and turns back into the dark interior of the estate.

Hawke follows with Nettle at her heels. When something shrieks in the canopy overhead, she turns back to see a gentle rain of black petals falling to the courtyard stones.

* * *

Hawke expected — foolishly, like most of her expectations — to find Margery Aix in gentle, doll-like repose. She'd only seen Margery twice before, and came away each time nearly overwhelmed by the unadulterated sweetness the little girl gave off. No more pinks cheeks, no more shining curls; at first glance, Hawke sees an old woman in the bed, hollowed out by age and hunger. If she hadn't stared without blinking, she wouldn't have believed Margery's narrow chest rose and fell at all.

But the girl breathes, and her eyes move ceaselessly under her lids. Not simply asleep, but dreaming. There's a pink silk coverlet pulled up to her armpits, pink ribbons in Margery's hair, and a well-worn chair pulled right up against the bed. Hawke's heart aches, in spite of the little barbs Lady Aix has thrown in her direction. If it would save Margery a moment's pain, Lady Aix would pour out her heart's blood on the spot.

Lady Aix sinks into the chair, and immediately wraps her hand around Margery's. "I begged the templars for one of the Circle healers to come see her," she says, not looking once in Hawke's direction. "Damn lot of good that Regeane was. Wouldn't speak unless one of the templars gave her leave, and then she just told me it wasn't sickness — she could pause it, for a time, but not cure it." She draws her free hand over her face, then clenches her fingers into a fist and presses them against her mouth. "Anyone could _see_ it's not a _fever_ or something she _ate_. Magic did this. _Magic_ ," she spits. "Fucking mages. They're a poison."

Hawke says nothing until Lady Aix's venom runs dry, at least temporarily, then takes a tentative step toward Margery's bed. Nettle presses close, practically vibrating with tension. She pats Nettle absently, then murmurs _sit_ without tearing her eyes from Margery's face.

"I'm sure you've been asked this a thousand times," she says, already considering how to convince Lady Aix to let Anders or Merrill take a look. "But who —"

"I told you, it was a bloody _mage_ who did this." Lady Aix's head droops, more unwashed hair sliding loose. All the heat has gone out of her voice, and now she is only a frail woman clinging to her child's hand, old before her time. "Maker knows there's enough of them in this world who would hurt a child, if they had the chance."

Ah, the selective memory of Kirkwall's nobles; they have enough trouble countenancing a Fereldan in their midst, and so they forget she's a mage besides, in spite of all the evidence before them.

"Was there anything in the days leading up to…" Hawke gropes for the right word, and settles for waving her hand in the air when none appear. "An argument, something Margery told you about? Did she come home hurt one day, or upset?"

Lady Aix inhales deeply. "Margery's a sensitive child." Her voice warms with each word, a little of the old resonance flooding back to fill the room. "She cries at every little thing, even the songbirds down in the market. Too soft a heart for Kirkwall." A thin, miserable smile cuts across her face. "She didn't get that from me, Champion, I'll tell you that."

That would sound much like a threat in any other context. "Are you sure there was nothing? No one who upset her?"

"The riots bothered her." Lady Aix runs her thumb over Margery's tiny knuckles, her eyes watching her daughter's face with such desperate hope Hawke turns her gaze away. "More than most things. She…she obsessed about them. Every day, she'd say, _Mama, are we safe? Will they come for us? Who's doing this?_ And every day, I'd tell her the same thing."

Hawke presses her tongue to a sore spot on her jaw while she waits.

"I'd tell her bad people were at fault, but the templars and guards would protect us, and she didn't have to worry." Lady Aix smooths the coverlet's folded edge. "And I told her I wouldn't let anything happen to her. She would be safe in my house, no matter what happened outside it." A single tear, slow as molten lead, tracks down her worn cheek. She makes no move to wipe it away. "I'd rather die," she says, her voice going crooked at the edges. "Do you hear me? I would rather _die_ , than this. My life's not worth piss without Margery. She _is_ my life. I pray, I practice charity, and all I've ever wanted is to keep her safe. If the Maker asked it, I'd cut my own fucking throat, just so long as Margery —"

Her voice breaks. Hawke hovers awkwardly on the other side of the bed, wanting to reach out and give what comfort she can, knowing any kindness will be rejected. Lady Aix hasn't forgotten that much of what she is.

"Did Margery ever speak of anyone?" she asks, while dust motes wheel through the air and Margery's eyes rove beneath her lids. "Perhaps, a woman with —"

The lifeless cast in Lady Aix's eyes falls away, and she rises blazing, before Hawke can draw another breath. Her hand grips Margery's white-knuckle-tight but the child doesn't stir. " _Who_?" Lady Aix cries, in fury and hope. From outside the bedroom comes a nervous murmur from the servants. "What do you know, Hawke? Who is she? Did she —"

"A possible lead, nothing more," says Hawke, her own voice low and smooth. "I hear rumors, sometimes in the strangest places —"

Her wrists throb.

"— and I've learned to look into everything, even coincidence _._ " _For there are no coincidences in Kirkwall,_ she thinks, going cold all over. Nettle leans against her thigh, and Hawke folds one of her ears into her palm. Lady Aix sits down, still trembling. "I won't give you false hope. It may be nothing — but tell me, please. Did Margery mention a woman like that?"

 _Beware the golden woman, Hawke._

Lady Aix shakes her head, her face contorting, like the gesture pains her. "No," she says, all the fury in her voice tamped down to ash. "She went to the markets with her nurses, and she bought new ribbons." She lets go of Margery's hand, and strokes the pink strips of silk glowing in her daughter's hair. "And she brought me candy," Lady Aix adds, more tears following the slow progress of the first. "She was _fine_ , until she didn't wake up. Oh, _Maker_."

Margery's bare arms are littered with the healed scratches typical of an active, curious little girl. Hawke's had looked much the same at that age, and so had Bethany's. Even the bruised elbows are familiar.

One long beaded scab is fresher than the others. Lady Aix's eyes are closed, so Hawke risks a careful touch of the girl's arm. Heat throbs against her fingers, coiling thick and inviting past her knuckles, and it takes all her self-control not to yank her arm away.

Compared to the sinuous malice she felt standing before the graffiti, this spell is a gossamer veil — but they were born from the same mage, the same magic: blood spilled across hot sand, the bite of iron in flesh.

What had she thought, with the first glow of certainty upon her? As easy as bumping against someone in the marketplace — and who would remark this scratch, among several, when a dreaming child wouldn't wake up?

 _The healer should have,_ she thinks, frowning to herself as she strokes Nettle's ear. _She would have noticed. I think I'll need to speak with this Regeane, and ask her about this little omission. And why_ this _poor child, and no others._

"She is my life," says Lady Aix, pulling Hawke from her thoughts. "If I lose her, I have nothing. Do you understand?"

Of course Hawke understands. The best of Leandra died in Ferelden long before she died in Darktown.

* * *

No etiquette is half so opaque as Orlais' — though Hawke supposes Nevarra might give it serious competition — but it can't be said Kirkwall doesn't make a fair effort. In spite of her years away, Hawke's mother picked up the little rituals and flourishes with the ease of spindleweed sprouting along a riverbank. Of course, Hawke listened with only half an ear when her mother tried to pass that knowledge along, happy to rely on her own numerous personal charms instead of some baroque code of conduct —

Ah, loss. It's like a well, dark and narrow, and when you drop a stone and listen for the splash, there's nothing but silence.

Hawke wishes she'd listened. Then she might know how to graciously take her leave of Lady Aix and Margery, but she didn't listen, and doesn't know, so she hovers beside the bed long after it becomes clear Lady Aix has forgotten her completely.

Lady Aix's face grows more gaunt as the outside light shifts, passing from merely haggard to ancient and ravaged, but Margery's face is as unchanging as Andraste's in the Chantry. Frozen in time by a healer's art, and still enough to pass for peaceful, if one doesn't look too closely.

The healer bought Margery time, nothing more. Hawke doesn't need Anders' skill to see that time is already running low. Another week, or ten days, and Margery will slip away.

 _No, she won't._

Another voice breaks into her thoughts, crackling with scorn: _Champion, what family have you ever truly saved_?

Hawke shuts her eyes. A familiar blow, but a blow nonetheless. She keeps her eyes closed until she hears footsteps stirring outside the sickroom, and a tentative knock upon the door.

Nettle springs up, barking an alert. Lady Aix starts, her hand slipping away from Margery's for an instant, then looks wild-eyed about the room. Hawke turns away, and watches the door open to admit a slender elven woman, with long white-blonde hair hanging in a braid over her shoulder and the velvet dress of a lady's maid. She cringes from Nettle, though the mabari has gone from battle-ready to bouncing in less than a heartbeat, and stays close to the door.

"Forgive my interruption, my lady, serah," she says, bowing deep to Lady Aix and bobbing in Hawke's general direction. "But there's a guard here, asking for Serah Hawke."

 _A rescue_ , Hawke thinks, relieved, and then immediately ashamed of herself. She stands, knees creaking, and looks back at Lady Aix. "Did they say what they needed?" she asks.

"No, serah," says the lady's maid, bobbing in apology. "She simply said it was urgent."

Hawke entertains the thought of Aveline coming to fetch her for some errand, but Aveline's own concrete rank guarantees her entry as much as the title of Champion guarantees Hawke's. If Aveline needed Hawke, she would fetch her directly.

"Please tell the guard I'll be right there," she says, and with a final bow, the lady's maid melts into the dark corridor.

Lady Aix gives Hawke a long, quiet look when she turns around to make her leave. "How did your mother bear it?" she asks. Something has faded from her gaze, and will never come back. Some ground, once ruined, can never grow again.

 _She didn't. She blamed me, so the weight would be mine._ "You won't have to know," Hawke says, and bites her tongue.

"Hawke." Not quite a question, but clearly a plea.

If her mother looked like this with Bethany in her arms, a bloody wreck of a best-loved child, Hawke never knew. She couldn't look at her mother then, and she can barely looked at Lady Aix now. There are some griefs too terrible to be witnessed.

"I'll do everything I can," says Hawke, as gently as she can, as she always does.

Lady Aix nods, like a badly-made puppet, and says nothing more. Hawke lingers, praying for the right words, and slips out, silent and shamed, when none arrive.

The lady's maid waits in the corridor to escort Hawke back to the main floor. Though she glances up at Hawke with wretched hope written on her face, she says nothing, but delivers Hawke into the care of the guard with a low bow before disappearing up the stairs once more.

"Serah Hawke," stage-whispers the guard, as soon as the lady's maid is gone. "Thank you, for coming, I'm sorry to interrupt, but I'm —"

"It's quite all right." Hawke offers a wan smile as the guard flushes to the roots of her hair. It's the pink-cheeked recruit from Aveline's office, a whole lifetime ago, just as awkward and bright-eyed as before, if more rain-spattered. "Now, Guardswoman —?"

"Lindie, serah, Guardswoman Lindie." She pulls open the front door, and stands aside to let Hawke step through first.

"Guardswoman Lindie," Hawke begins, then hesitates on the doorstep. The return of the rain has left the inner courtyard slick-stoned, with the green of the vines turned black to match their blooms. Rain patters on the dense canopy, then drips down the vines in fat drops that fall, thick with dark pollen, to the stones. She hadn't thought it was possible to make the courtyard _more_ unappealing, but it seems the weather is determined to prove her wrong.

Hawke tosses her head and strides into the courtyard. There's been enough jumping at every shadow to last her several lifetimes. A forlorn courtyard won't get the better of her.

"Tell me," she says, as Lindie shuts the door and hurries to catch up, "what does the guard-captain need of me?"

"Well," says Lindie, then stops. Hawke pauses mid-step, listening to a few stray drops of rain striking her armor, and waits for the guardswoman to go on. "The guard-captain is at the Gallows, serah," Lindie says, eventually. "With the knight-commander."

"Hell and _shit_ ," Hawke says without thinking, as her stomach plummets. Has her nightmare followed her into waking life? "That's —" _Awful. Unacceptable._ "Unexpected," she finishes. "Why is my presence required?"

Of all the times for Meredith to want to speak to Hawke, it had to be now, as she left a noble's home in her Hightown best. If Anders' paranoia was unfounded before, it won't be by the time the news reaches the Gallows. She should have _thought_ — but she hadn't. As always.

 _What if this is how Meredith finally gets you?_ cries the frightened mouse in her mind. _There's a cell with your name on it, and a lock on only one side. All the gold in the Deep Roads, and you won't be able to buy your way out._

"They didn't say, serah." Lindie gives an apologetic shrug, then bats the closest vine. "Only that I was to fetch you straightaway, and bring you to the Gallows."

 _Bring you to the Gallows_. The taste of salt fills Hawke's mouth. A flurry of images — Meredith's implacable face, Fenris' blank eyes, a gauntlet flashing light as it swings toward her face — crowds her mind, and to buy herself a little time, Hawke reaches up and plucks a handful of the blooms. Their spicy smell drives back the salt, though the thick, leathery texture of the petals disgusts her almost as much. She tosses them away, and dusts the black pollen from her palm.

"Let's not keep them waiting," she says, brightly as an apostate can.

* * *

Thank you, as always, for reading!


	11. Chapter 11

Previously: Hawke visited Lady Aix and the stricken Margery, who seemed almost beyond recovery. — but further investigation was delayed, when a summons from the knight-commander herself called Hawke to the Gallows.

Onward…

For seven months, Hawke's avoided the Gallows, as best as one can avoid a grey implacable beast slouched in the corner of one's eye. She can't see it from any of her windows — happy, blessed coincidence — but she is aware of it always, its presence curling through Kirkwall like a current of molten lead. If magic has taste, has touch, the Gallows is the absence of both. Pleasure is not simply denied here, but erased.

The sight of the first broad steps — no weeds dare to break through the cracks here, nor does the usual city dirt coat the stones — brings Meeran to mind, for the first time in years. He thought it a great joke to send her here, to deliver unto the templars their furtive luxuries. Oh, how he'd laughed to see her go, and she learned early and quick not to show a shred of hesitation. Not much for brains, Meeran, but the scum-sucking bastard had a bloodhound's nose for weakness. If she hadn't made herself bloody indispensable — the _bloody_ sometimes being quite literal — he might have turned her in for the biggest laugh of all, hang Gamlen and all his promises.

But he hadn't, and once that fear faded another swam up to take its place: the templars would sniff out the magic in her blood, the lyrium pooled in her gut from a fight two days before, and drag her through the smallest of the courtyard gates. Hawke had seen it happen. There are no words to describe that old relief, the silent prayer of thanks to the Maker that she still walked free, nor are there words for the shame that always followed. Yes, she was half-starving, a cold sore always waiting at the corner of her mouth, with fingers bloody and leathers stained — but she could still walk out into the city, because to the templars, all the refugees blurred into one faceless, selfish mob. What did they care about this bit of Fereldan mud, so long as she didn't stain their armor?

One of the mages had screamed as the templars brought them in the gates. _Not here, no, please, I have to get out, it'll swallow me up —_

 _And what did you do?_ says Anders' voice, eager to drive the old barbs home. _You turned around and left. As long as you were safe, it didn't matter._

Hawke shakes her head to knock his voice loose, then tries to cover the motion — badly — with a cough when Lindie glances her way. The guardswoman has been excellent company through the rainy city, which means she hasn't said a word while keeping a steady pace all the way through Lowtown. She didn't raise a protest when Hawke insisted on a brief stop at home to fetch her staff, though her expression had questioned the wisdom of the delay.

Wisdom could go hang. There was no bloody way Hawke was walking into the Gallows armed only with her array of smiles and a mabari.

As added insurance, she left a note with Bodahn, reading it twice after she finished to make sure her words would trigger as little alarm as possible. No repeats of her unannounced trip to the Chantry; the last thing she needs is her friends to worry, or to storm the Gallows on her behalf — though it would be hilarious, she's sure, until they were all slaughtered like day-old chicks.

Now Hawke and Lindie face the stairs into the Gallows, and though her Aveline-instilled discipline does not let her shift from foot to foot, Lindie clearly wants to. Or to run full-tilt in the opposite direction, which Hawke feels is the only rational option.

Hawke licks rainwater from her lips and runs her fingertips over the scratches in her wrist. They throb faintly, in counterpoint to the rain.

 _Time to say goodbye to the nice guardswoman and get moving._

Her feet don't want to obey. Nettle whines softly and bumps Hawke's hand with her nose. A few years ago, it had been the rage in what passed for Kirkwall's literary scene to compare everything to the body, or at least bits of it. Hightown, the beautiful face; the Lowtown markets, the belly. Fenris, she remembers with a pang, and a ferocious longing for him at her side, had smirked approvingly over what the docks had been compared to. _Filth and filth_ , he'd said, nodding like a sage.

The Chantry was the warm sweet-smelling heart of the city, and the Keep both its mind and its strong arms. What then, does that make the Gallows?

 _It'll swallow me up_.

"Well," Hawke says, before her voice can utterly desert her. "I suppose it's like pulling a rotten tooth. Best to get it over with before it ruins the rest of your day."

Lindie bobs a nod, and brushes rain from her hair. "Of course, serah, but —" She gives the stairs a dubious look, then pulls back, eyes narrowing.

Hawke follows the line of her gaze up the stairs, digging her nails into her arm when she sees two templars approach, shiny as fresh-minted tin soldiers. A flash of memory knocks her off-balance: the statues rising from the water before her door, one reaching up to pull off its head. But that had been Carver, under the rain and armor and madness, with Keran behind him. She would bet her life on neither of them standing before her now.

The thought of being so close to Carver drives a cold, steely pain through her chest. Does he know his sister stands at the gates?

Her mind would like consider that, rather than register the templars' steady progress down the stairs. Nettle paces forward a few steps to plant herself between Hawke and the templars, and the loyalty finally goads Hawke out of her self-indulgent stasis.

"Thank you, guardswoman," she says, with a firm nod in Lindie's direction. The templars have arrived, but she has her chosen smile in place — sixth-best, soft and helpless as a newborn rabbit — by the time they speak her name.

Lindie hovers a moment, still glaring at the templars, before making a derisive noise in the back of her throat and marching away into the rain. Hawke is both unsurprised by the commentary, and relieved Lindie restrained herself. The city guard are nothing if not Aveline's partisans. Hawke appreciates anyone who appreciates her friends, but she would like as auspicious a beginning as possible to this meeting of the minds.

 _If Aveline is even here_ , she thinks, her feet trying once more to root her to the ground. She buries one hand in Nettle's fur and forces herself to take a step, and then another. The templars fall in a step behind her, one to either side; the rain on their armor sounds like a faint drumroll and Hawke has to bite her tongue to hold back a nervous laugh. _Auspicious, remember?_

No one is about in the courtyard, save a few templars on guard duty, who manage to look miserable even under full armor, and Sol, whom Hawke has never seen more than ten feet from his stall. He lifts a hand but Hawke sees him see the templars a moment later, and his cheerful wave pauses mid-arc. She inclines her head, putting a little more life into her smile, before she turns her head to the little gate at the end of the courtyard.

Well, if she's to be eaten, at least she's sure to give indigestion. She waits while the templars call for the gate to open, then strides through with Nettle keeping pace beside her, ears pricked forward and eyes watchful.

The half-dozen templars waiting in the space beyond the courtyard don't turn their heads at her approach, but Hawke senses the minute adjustments they make to their postures to put their hands a fraction of an inch closer. She may have only her staff, and be dressed like a fine Hightown lady, but what she truly is hangs in the air like dew upon a web: _Champion. Mage. Apostate. Ours_.

 _No, not yours,_ she thinks, lifting her chin, warmth beginning deep in her chest. _Not ever._

Anders sneers in the back of her head.

The walk to Meredith's office is not a long one, and could claim to be pleasant if one wasn't aware of what lay behind every door — if one didn't have two templars trampling along on either side of oneself. There are windows aplenty, bits of greenery here and there, and everything is clean as bleached bones. Hawke can't appreciate a bit of it, even taking Meredith out of consideration. Pride does not keep the plants healthy, nor the floors gleaming; one of the Tranquil moves like a wraith from one window to the next, wiping them clean with a focus that freezes the air in Hawke's lungs. The Tranquil doesn't look up as Hawke passes, but keeps moving their cloth in deliberate circles over the glass.

One door stands open, the sounds of quill on parchment and rustling pages escaping. Hawke dares a glance inside, and finds Orsino sitting at his desk, scratching away behind towers of books. With that sharp hairline and squinted eyes, one could almost pretend he's simply a scholar lost in his research. He looks up as she passes, and no scholar's gaze would be quite so direct, and yet so guarded. Outburst aside, Orsino couldn't have survived here without an immense amount of control, and so his reaction to Hawke's passage is a mere double-blink before he goes back to his writing.

 _Might I borrow a little of that restraint, First Enchanter?_ Hawke thinks. _It would do me ever so much good right about now_.

Nettle huffs as they reach Meredith's door, and glances up at Hawke. Not for reassurance — no mabari at work ever requires that — but to gauge Hawke's reaction. A frown from Hawke and she would be ready to strike. Lucky for them all, templar escort in particular, Hawke's already exchanged her limpid smile for the expression she uses for the seneschal: _I'm going to pretend you don't think I'm something you found on the bottom of your boot_.

Neither of the templars speak — not a single word has passed their metal-shrouded lips this entire journey — nor do either of them open the door for her. Hawke pushes it open herself, very aware of the picture she makes for those waiting within the room — the Champion, a small, painted woman in a pretty dress, framed by two templars. How eloquent a reminder; with anyone else, Hawke would roll her eyes and call this the power-play it so surely is.

 _Well, I suppose when one has all the power, it's not really playing at it, is it? Maker, I should have updated my will._ Her staff is like a bundle of twigs at her back, but she feels an near-cheerful resignation, like the Hawke she was before the Hanged Man, and the gauntlet, and all the smell of magebane. Yes, she's still nervous — that's self-preservation, where she stands — but she sees her fear for what it is: doubt. In herself, in her power, which doesn't seem like much in the Gallows — but she is the Champion of Kirkwall, earned by her own deeds and named by Meredith herself, and she cannot have that taken away without Meredith's own foundations crumbling. They're tied together, which must be quite a blister on Meredith's version of a soul. There's comfort to take in that.

The sea likes this new line of thought very much. Without the cover of rain and her footsteps, Hawke hears its voice like a lullaby at the edge of her thoughts, and welcomes it.

Then Meredith looks up from the table, glacial eyes falling upon Hawke's face, and the last of the quailing in Hawke's soul disappears. It's not simply from Aveline's presence — though Hawke is sure no one's even been more grateful for the sight of red hair, in the history of Thedas — but from the inescapable fact that nightmares are always larger in the dark. Meredith can take any form in a dream, but with the same dismal light falling on both their faces, she can only be herself. A proud woman, stern and shining in her armor, but one with crows' feet and frown lines that look like marks chiseled in stone. An unexpected swell of sympathy fills Hawke; never has Meredith looked like a woman who's known a spark of joy.

She keeps that thought off her face, and gives the women standing before her a nod before footing the door closed in the templars' faces. Nettle prances forward to Aveline, who tries to frown at the mabari but fails, like a good Fereldan, and chucks Nettle under the chin.

"Aveline, Meredith, you're both looking well." Hawke joins them at the table, tossing back her hood and scanning the papers littered before her. Maps of the city, a few letters, and what look like guard assignments. She gives herself one heartbeat to be relieved — it does not, at present, look like anyone is about to be made Tranquil or murdered; things are looking up — then glances at Aveline. The smile Nettle conjured is long gone; if Meredith's face is carved rock, Aveline's is fresh-forged steel. Hawke's almost sorry she missed the first part of the conversation.

"To what do I owe the honor of being summoned to…this?" she asks, layers of fear and anxiety falling away like shed snakeskin, leaving her mouth free to do as it likes. "Not that I don't mind a walk in the rain, it's ever so refreshing."

Aveline closes her eyes, and begins to look like a woman in prayer. Meredith doesn't spare Hawke a single look.

"We have encountered a problem that requires your skills, Champion." The disdain in Meredith's voice could peel ironbark off its tree at a hundred paces.

"There's no 'we' about it, Hawke," Aveline says, before Hawke can jump in with some Isabela-worthy quip about her _skills_ , which is probably for the best. "The knight-commander —" The scorn in Aveline's voice nearly sears off Hawke's eyebrows. "— doesn't think her templars should —"

"It is not what I think," Meredith interrupts, leaving Aveline smoldering on the other side of the table, "it is a fact: my templars are most needed here, in the Gallows, not shoring up gaps in _your_ defenses, guard-captain."

Hawke steals another glance at the maps. There's been no word of more than the usual Kirkwall unpleasantness, but there are no _if_ s in this city, only _when_ s — and sure enough, the maps littered across the table are mainly of the docks, red marks scrawled at entrances, exits, and chokepoints.

"Is there another riot coming?" she asks, tapping the topmost map with two gloved fingers. Nettle sniffs at the maps, then sighs and wanders back to Hawke's side. Hawke scratches her ears and waits for a response.

"We don't know," Aveline says, reluctantly. "There's been no word, but there weren't for the others —"

"That you know of," Meredith interjects, as Hawke expected she would. A studied pause follows. "You cannot dispute there have been lapses in your ranks, guard-captain, at all levels."

Aveline rears back. Hawke's blood runs cold on Meredith's behalf, a wholly unprecedented experience. She has a dizzying mental image of Aveline drawing her sword, and the room fading into a welter of red, but Aveline exhales, hard and sharp, through her nose, and gives Meredith an icy little smile.

"How long have you been been waiting to throw that in my face, knight-commander? A whole three years?"

"I merely state fact," Meredith replies, supremely unruffled. "The actions of your guardsman were a travesty, and your failure to discipline him a severe blow to your credibility."

She shifts the maps while Aveline turns to Hawke, a plea for defense clear in her gaze. Hawke stares back, unwilling to lend her voice to this particular debate. Another unprecedented experience: she agrees with Meredith. In all the running for her life and trying to keep Kirkwall off the twin cliffs of death or conversion, she hadn't said a damn thing to Aveline beyond that first shocked demand for truth. By the time she rose from her sickbed, it seemed too late. Besides — how does one tell one's dear friend they failed so completely?

Just like that, perhaps. Still — if she blames Aveline, she must blame Isabela, and the Viscount, and the Arishok, and herself. Half of Kirkwall helped crack that egg. It helps no one to cast blame now.

"Let's get back to the topic at hand," she says instead. Aveline's face shutters, and she shifts a little farther down the table. Hawke holds back a sigh. She'll pay for that later, but Aveline's been disappointed in her before. They'll both survive another go-around. "I'll never deny I have many, many uses, but what good could I be here?"

Meredith considers her for a long time. Hawke feels a thrill of anxiety wind its way up her spine, and a cringing voice tells her to mind her manners, but she doesn't flinch from Meredith's gaze. At last, Meredith stands straight and looks away.

"You have a talent for getting others to do what you like," she says. "Before you arrived, Champion, I was reminding the guard captain of your retrieval of Emile de Launcet. Accomplished without violence or coercion, it seems."

"It's called an abundance of charm by some," Hawke says, not pointing out she slaughtered Huon and Evelina almost on sight. "I'm flattered if you think I can convince rioters to…not riot, simply because I have a winning personality, but it seems unlikely."

Meredith and Aveline give her matching flat looks. Hawke dredges up her best Charming Idiot expression, and beams at them both. "What did you have in mind?" she asks sweetly.

"Go to the Keep," Meredith says, after letting the silence drag out for a few more seconds. "Speak to the survivors being held there. Use this — _abundance_ of yours to find out why they began such violence to begin with. Perhaps your approach will work where others have not."

Now it's Hawke's turn to jump in before Aveline can open her mouth. "I do have a face people trust," she says, then curses silently when Meredith's eyes flick to her scars. Before she can regret her choice of words too much, she has a vague memory curl through her mind: hadn't Aveline told her, before the Hanged Man, what those survivors had said?

If Aveline had, it's gone now. If she goes, if she asks, it may come back to her — but can she afford the distraction? The sea hums in her head, like a plucked string, but seems unbothered by the prospect.

 _No coincidences._ She strokes Nettle's head, and does her best to ignore how her stomach knots at saying yes to Meredith's request — a request in name only, of course. What will Anders have to say about this, when he hears?

"I would be grateful, Champion," says Meredith, each word perfectly balanced, the tip of a blade at her throat.

* * *

Aveline's annoyance rings like a bell through the hallway outside Meredith's office, and folds around Hawke in thick layers, nearly heavy enough to keep out the rain. Though she's clearly plotting just how to lay into Hawke as soon as they're out of templar earshot, she still walks at Hawke's side, each step firm as a Chantry foundation, glaring down every helmeted head that dares to turn in their direction.

Well, if one _must_ walk through the Gallows, one could do far worse than having a mabari and the guard-captain as escorts. Hawke manages to keep the cliff-jumper urge to wave at the templars under control, and concentrates on matching her stride to Aveline's. No small task, given that Aveline stands nearly head and shoulders taller than her, and the task keeps her occupied till they've left both Gallows and temptation behind. As soon as they've traded the Gallows for the docks, Aveline explodes.

"Of all the —" She stalks forward through the rain, leaving Hawke and Nettle behind. Two drunken sailors list into her path, laughing, then scramble to get away as soon as their eyes fall on Aveline's face. "Damn templars — I should like to — bloody Meredith and her —"

Hawke skips ahead a few steps, gnawing at her cheek to keep herself from asking Aveline if she plans to finish a sentence in the next few minutes. A long time ago, Hawke learned to let Aveline's anger blow itself out, like a storm over the sea, and any attempts to help or calm her would only keep the gale winds blowing longer.

 _Ooh, I'll have to tell Isabela, she'll like that turn of phrase_. She reaches Aveline's side, a little out of breath, and looks up to find Aveline glaring down at her.

"You look far too cheerful to have walked out of the same conversation I did," Aveline snaps.

 _Here it comes._ "I find I'm always in a good mood when I walk out of the Gallows with my personality intact," she replies, mildly as she can. From the corner of her eye, she sees Nettle aiming herself toward a puddle, and pulls Aveline out of splash range. "Believe it or not, that was one of my top five interactions with our dear knight-commander."

"I suppose I should be grateful I was witness to it." Aveline stops midstep, not seeming to mind she's ankle-deep in a muddy pothole. Hawke reads what's coming by the minute shifts in Aveline's expression and takes a deep breath. "Hawke, you should know —"

"Don't, Aveline." Most of Hawke's share of kindness went to Lady Aix that morning, but what little she has left, she puts into her voice. If the day comes they share nothing else, she and Aveline still walked out of Ferelden together. Kindness is the least she owes her oldest friend. "Don't try to justify it, or make it better. I'm not the one who needed to hear it."

Aveline nods, eyes skating around the grey street, jaw working. "So," she says, after a long enough pause to let the rain soak through Hawke's hood and for Nettle to have found two more puddles. "You're going to do this for Meredith?"

"Of course I am. I said so, didn't I?"

"I thought — you know, it'd —" Aveline knuckles a few strands of wet hair out of her eye and spreads her hands with a sigh. "Hawke, forgive me for sounding obvious, but she's about as far from a friend as you can get."

Hawke's smile feels like cracks in old clay. "Do you know, Merrill and Anders are staying with me right now? Merrill has an awful cold, like half the elves in the city, I hear, and Anders is — well, you've met him, so I don't need to say anything else. But his clinic is still open. It's off the templar sweep routes, and they don't go to the alienage half so often as they used to."

Aveline lifts her chin. "So a trade, then." Disapproval mingles with comprehension in her voice.

"A trade makes it sound like there's equal footing." Hawke starts walking again, chafing her hands to warm them. "It's a matter of being useful. The moment I'm not — well." She whistles for Nettle, who's ranged down an alley, no doubt questing after some awful smell's source. "At least I'm not hunting other mages this time."

There's nothing to say to that, and Aveline is wise enough to know it. Hawke whistles again, exasperation pushing back her relief at walking out of the Gallows as herself. "Nettle, come on, whatever you're after won't be as nice as a good bone in front of a warm fire — Nettle?"

She's reached Nettle's alley, which is just as dark and reeking as all the others in Lowtown, but there's no sign of Nettle within, not even a hint of scratching. Hawke reaches inward, and draws a handful of light from the brightness still welling in her chest. Not even Meredith could dim that — but the light is small, and barely illuminates the entrance of the alley.

"Nettle?" Her pulse leaps in her throat as she steps inside. "Fool dog — Nettle! Come!"

The alley is littered with rubbish, broken wooden crates piled higher than her head, not a sightline anywhere — and it's that word, _sightline_ , that has her drawing her staff from her back and moving forward to let Aveline in behind her. She pushes past the first piles of splintered wood, the light held high in her hand, and nearly screams when she sees Nettle lying on her side beside a mound of old rags.

There's no blood, but she can't see if Nettle's breathing. Her first instinct is to run to Nettle's side — dogs are family, her father said, never trust anyone who doesn't agree — but Aveline catches her arm and yanks her back.

"Guardswoman," Aveline says. "Report."

Hawke's first thought is correction — _I'm not one of your bloody guards, I don't report to you_ — but when she regains a little clarity, she tears her eyes away from Nettle's still form to follow Aveline's gaze. And there is indeed a guardswoman in the alley, half-hidden by the crates, staring down at Nettle.

"Guardswoman Lindie!" Aveline shouts, and Lindie twitches upright, training reasserting itself. Aveline could outyell the Maker if she so choose, Hawke thinks with a hysterical laugh bubbling up her throat. If Lindie laid one finger on Nettle, she's a dead woman. She tries to pull away from Aveline, but the hand gripping her arm doesn't loosen. "I said, _report_!"

Lindie draws a deep breath. Her whole body seems to shudder as she does, little spasms traveling up and down her arms, but she turns to Aveline, nodding all the while.

"Guard-captain," she says, " _don't_." Her lips move clumsily over the words, like someone mouthing a language they don't understand, but her movements are smooth once the tremors fade, and she draws her blade with what Hawke could almost call grace.

She feels the blood magic first, the hot coils winding past her ankles, slow as poured syrup. The air thickens about her, and then the rich over-heated tang fills her nose: blood and iron, the gaudy sun overhead. There are tears on Lindie's face as she charges them.

"Guardswoman!" Aveline brings her shield around as she bellows — because of course Aveline won't hurt one of her own guards, not unless she has to — but Lindie doesn't pause. She skirts neatly past Nettle's body, stomping crates flat under her boots, and lifts her sword in a killing arc.

Hawke's seen how hard Aveline drills her guards. Even a newcomer like Lindie is deadly — and Aveline hasn't drawn her sword.

 _Maker, please, let this work_ , Hawke prays, and reaches for her mana.

This is no conjuring of light or heat; there is ice in her heart, and wind, and she calls on them both. Her staff hums in her clenched fist as her mana surges through her arm and into the wood, and a crackling sheet of star-white frost coats Lindie from hips to feet.

"Hawke!" Aveline cries, still a second behind — how can she not _smell_ the blood magic, it's oozing from the stones at their feet, mixing with the rain, it's _everywhere_. "What are you doing?"

Lindie roars as her legs are trapped by a thick wreath of white, and starts hacking away at the ice with her sword. Her cheeks are still marked with tears, but her face twists, hard enough to bruise, as someone else's anger goads her onward. "Champion!" she screams, as the ice splinters. "You will — you will _not —_ "

 _Like hell I won't, whatever it is_ , Hawke thinks, drawing once more on her mana. She can drive Lindie to the ground, and buy time enough to restrain the poor wretch — but she needs time before that to shape the spell around Aveline, and not send her friend crashing down as well.

It takes three seconds to narrow the spell just to Lindie. It takes two for Lindie to free herself and charge them once more. Aveline shoves Hawke out of the way and takes the blow square on the shield, letting Lindie drive her back without dropping her arm. By the time Lindie's pulling back to swing once more, Aveline's drawn her own blade, and meets Lindie's sword midair.

There's no contest; Aveline could hand half the city its arse on a bad day — but Lindie is no ordinary opponent, not with someone else's will driving her. She batters at Aveline's shield, gobbling in her throat and weeping, oh, _Maker_ , and in defending herself, Aveline can make no progress.

Hawke hauls herself to her feet, not letting herself look in Nettle's direction, and gathers the scattered motes of her spell back together. She risks hitting Aveline — but oh, bloody hell —

The instant before she releases the wave of force, some noise at her back catches her attention. She whirls, staff raised and crackling with blue-white energy, searching the darkness of the alley. Perhaps Nettle is waking, she thinks, and sure enough, Nettle is stirring and groaning, but that is not the only movement in the alley. A hooded figure watches from the far end, a dark globe held in their hand.

Hawke twists her mana, reweaves it into shafts of burning force, and sends the spell toward the still figure. A pearly shield bursts into shape a few feet before the figure, and barely — _barely_ absorbs the spell. They stagger, and Hawke thinks she hears a sharp gasp, but before she can raise another spell, the figure lifts its arm and throws.

Hawke watches the globe spin end over end as it flies in a lazy arc toward her, frozen for a heartbeat by dreadful inevitability. At the last second, Aveline lets out a choked yell, and Hawke spins away, the spell already flying from her staff. She barely hears the globe shatter upon the stones as Lindie is torn away from Aveline, then slammed shoulder-first into the ground, but she feels the liquid soaking hungrily through her cloak and dress, and then its insidious touch upon her skin.

 _He laughed,_ her mind shouts, in the voice of a frightened child. _He laughed while he hit me and I can still feel it on me, oh Maker,_ please _, not again_.

She waits for silence to fall within herself. No brightness, no certainty can save her; the magebane has touched her skin. At the edge of her vision, the hooded figure waves, before it backs toward the blackness at the end of the alley.

Hawke follows them, still gripping her soon-to-be-useless staff. The silence will come, her heart will beat in its prison of raw absence — this is nothing she hasn't faced before, and she will survive. This time, she has the blade at the end of her staff.

Two heartbeats have passed, enough time for the magebane to spread through her dress and mat the fabric to her leg. The figure is still in sight, their backwards steps unhurried. They're deliberately slow, Hawke thinks, because they want to watch the magebane take hold.

 _Did you not see enough the first time_? The old scream fills her throat; firelight flashes on metal in her mind's-eye, then the tooth, spat loose onto the blood-spattered floor. _That wasn't enough?_

And then a child's cry: _Why?_

She hears the figure laugh, and the scream tears loose from the prison of her teeth and tongue. Her jaw aches, her eye aches, her scars are burning — and light blazes from the end of her staff, the starved white and gold of fire.

The explosion of heat sucks the air from her lungs and boils off the water pooled on the alley floor. Such rare heat, such _light_ — the last time she cast its like was for the bastard Alrik, and it had been a mad torrent, uncontrolled and short-lived, too volatile to sustain.

Now — now the fire pours from her staff like an arrow loosed from a bow, as true as the edge of a sword, and it converges on the cloaked figure before they can scream. The fire swallows them with a short, vicious roar, and then the entire alley glows in the light of their burning.

They scream as they burn, thrashing and spinning and hitting the alley walls as they try to beat out the flames. Hawke calls the spell back, her heart like a hummingbird behind her ribs, and presses her free hand to her breastbone. Her mana sings within, drained but ready, and the magebane is no more than an oil slick against her skin.

She casts a stream of ice toward the tiny inferno still twisting and screaming before her, and watches the figure collapse in a steaming pile to the ground. They're weeping, whoever they are, and the stench of their cooked flesh chokes Hawke with every breath she takes.

Aveline curses behind her, and Lindie lets out a muffled cry. There's a heavy, clanking thud, and a little more swearing, and then Lindie's weeping joins the figure's, lost and bewildered.

Hawke lets her staff fall from her numb hand and drops to her knees beside the figure. The hood of their cloak burned away in the fire, leaving their blackened face bare to her gaze. One side is a ruin of cooked skin, some of it burned to char and already flaking away, but enough of them remains for Hawke to recognize them: the chestnut seller, who called to her so sweetly whenever she passed his stall.

"You," she whispers, her face going cold. "But you're —"

He coughs, and tries to smile. His remaining eye bores into hers, a mad hate seething within it. "You stupid fucking bitch," he manages. "How did you — how didn't it —" He coughs, bloody drool leaking from his mouth. "Fucking bitch," he says, each word clear as crystal. "Couldn't just stay out of the way. She'll kill — kill you. Kill —"

Hawke bares her teeth, and he chokes himself off with a rattle deep in his chest. At last she's eye to eye with a piece of this madness, and the depth of her fury frightens her. She could drag it out for _hours_ , if she wished, burning and freezing in turns, until she'd cooked him to the bone a hundred times over. Payment for the fear, the pain, the humiliation.

She catches herself an instant later. She could — but she will not. Mad or not, vengeful or not, she will not be cruel. Not yet.

"Give me her name," she whispers, leaning close as she can bear it. "You have nothing to lose. Do something right, while you still can."

The chestnut seller laughs. "Always more to lose," he whispers back, a dark froth at the corner of his mouth. "You'll see, Champion. She'll — she'll show —"

He dies between one word and the next, and Hawke pushes herself away from the pile of charred meat and fabric. Behind her, she hears Aveline binding a still-weeping Lindie, swearing and panting, and the gentle scrape of mabari claws on stone. A moment later, Nettle nuzzles Hawke's good cheek, whining and listing from side to side, and Hawke buries her face in the stiff, wet fur.


	12. Chapter 12

**Previously:** Hawke left the Gallows, after agreeing to Meredith's request to investigate the cause of the riots in Kirkwall's docks. Aveline was less than pleased by this arrangement, but before she and Hawke could truly broach the issues at hand, they were attacked by an enthralled guardswoman.

The blood mage pulling the guardswoman's strings, however, soon discovered Hawke was far from helpless.

Onward…

 **Note** : this chapter contains dissociation, self-harm, graphic violence/injury, and emotional abuse (of the villain-to-hero variety).

* * *

Aveline pauses with her key in the final lock. "Are you sure you want to do this?" she asks. "Now, that is."

Hawke was sick of this question the first time Aveline asked; now, she simply feels a weariness so deep she's almost nauseous.

 _Visiting Meredith always did have that effect on me_ , she thinks, rubbing her eyes. A heavy parade of footsteps sounds overhead as the city guard file through their shift change, some heading to their supper, others heading for patrol. She listens, till Aveline clears her throat.

"I'm sure." Hawke pushes away from the wall. "Not like there's going to be a better time for it. I'm here, they're here, might as well get it done. Maybe then Meredith will get off your back."

Aveline snorts. "And then Meredith and Orsino will dance the Remigold. Hawke —"

"Let's get it done." With Nettle at her side, Hawke steps up to the door, then nods at the key, and Aveline's hand upon it. "Really, Aveline, I'm fine."

She gets a dubious look in reply, but even Aveline must admit that burning a blood mage to death doesn't even crack the top twenty worst things Hawke has ever done. The key is turned, the door is opened, and Hawke enters the Keep's dungeons, Nettle pacing at her heels.

It smells the way she imagined it would: mildew, piss, and despair. Most of the light is collected around the station just beyond the doorway, where two guards jostle each other and their lamps in their hurry to salute their captain, but a few torches spill fitful warmth and illumination through the narrow hall.

"At ease," Aveline says from over Hawke's shoulder. "The Champion's here on official business. One hour, Hawke. I'll send a runner to your estate, let them know what you're up to."

She turns around, cringing inwardly as her dress catches on the last of the magebane. If only she'd managed a bath first. Or simply been able to pour a kettle of boiling water over herself. "You're not staying?"

Stupid question. Of course Aveline wouldn't be staying, she has an unconscious guardswoman and all the business of the guard to attend to.

 _Surely I can manage a little chat on my own_.

Surely she can, but it's always nice to have Aveline as back-up. She's even better at looming than Fenris, and never tries to deny it. A pity looming, of any sort, would probably be counter-productive.

Aveline crooks an eyebrow. "What, afraid you'll miss me?"

"Oh, I'm just used to you spying on my every move."

A snort, then a sidelong look and a glimmer of green concern. "You're a big girl, Hawke. We'll talk in an hour. Guardsmen."

Hawke faces back toward the cells before the door closes. The guards go back to their hastily-abandoned card game, leaving her in an island of dim silence. Nettle noses at her hand, then sniffs down the hall. Her stump of a tail begins to wag.

"Yes, I'm sure it all smells fascinating, but we're here on business, like Aveline said." Hawke brushes her knuckles along Nettle's spine, baring her teeth as her mana brushes the last dregs of a hex. It's barely noticeable now, compared to that horrible alley, but even these frayed ends have teeth. They snap at her mental fingers as she traces its edges.

The bastard is lucky she only burned him to death, she tells herself, and starts down the hall.

It was a miserable walk back to the Keep, by any standard: Lindie gave up on consciousness not two steps out of the alley, which Hawke saw as a mercy, though it meant taking the guardswoman's weight fully between herself and Aveline. Hawke knows she had the far lighter end of the deal, but the rain, the wind, the dead weight of a guard in full armor — her shoulders still ache, and she's soaked, even her smalls.

The only upside is the rain washed most of the magebane away. She may be half-frozen, her paints and rouge smeared or rinsed clean off, she may never be dry again, but her mana still brims over in her chest, a singing bird within the cage of her ribs.

It may still disappear. She's trying not to hope the magebane was washed away before it could work its harm. Trying, and mostly failing. Perhaps this errand will prove enough of a distraction to get her through the worst, should the worst come calling.

 _Selfish idiot. Get to work._

Her boots make ridiculous squelching noises and leave tiny pools of water behind her. The guards' quiet murmurs — puzzling over what the Champion's errand might be; they'll have the best gossip in the barracks tonight — fade away the farther down she goes, past empty cells and flickering torches. Soon she hears nothing but Nettle's claws clicking on the stones, and her own quiet breathing. The sea is a distant whisper in her head, watchful and patient.

The survivors are in a cluster of cells halfway down the corridor. Hawke hears them before she reaches them, five distinct voices blurring together. One laughs, an endless, toneless _ha, ha, ha_ , another sings the same verse again and again: _oh where are you going says Miller to Mulder, oh I cannot tell says Festle to Fose._ Two voices mutter, and the last voice weeps, like a hopeless child left to comfort itself alone.

It's cold down here, surrounded by Maker knows how much chilly rock and earth. There's more to the Keep than this one dungeon, cells upon cells where not even the rats will linger, waiting in perfect silence until their time to be used comes again.

The Gallows is not the only place in Kirkwall where people are forgotten. The Veil gets thinner the farther down you go. Here, it holds her weight, but barely. Put a foot wrong, and she'll slip through, falling without end.

 _oh where are you going says Miller to Mulder_

"I don't know," Hawke murmurs.

"Champion?" calls one of the guards. "Is everything all right?" A chair scrapes as they stand, ready to come to her aid, just as quick Aveline would expect, but she waves them back without looking.

"Quite, thank you. Just lost in thought." _Well, "lost_ " _is certainly accurate._ She shivers and rubs her arms. Part of her expects the sea to come swelling through one of the thin places all about her, urging her forward, but it remains no more than a plucked-string shiver against her mana.

The guard hovers a moment more before they take their seat. Once they pull back to the table, the corridor is filled again with the five voices, warped by stone and madness. No wonder the guards keep to their table, half the dungeon away. Just standing at the edge of those voices makes Hawke's skin prickle, and her teeth ache. She pushes herself forward, stroking Nettle's ear when the mabari whines.

Even though she's expecting it, the spell's remnants catch her by the throat. She begins to pull her shield about her, but lets it spin back into nothing before it can reach her knees. There are stout oak doors and iron locks between her and any harm, but it's the thought of what her magic might do — or not do, horrible thought — in this quiet, haunted place that truly stops her.

The spell's been slowly dying since before the Hanged Man, but enough remains to buzz warningly against her skin. No sinuous grace here; this spell is a wasp, burrowing into minds instead of flesh. Against her will, Hawke's impressed, and revolted because of it. This kind of spell takes finesse, which isn't generally something one attributes to blood mages. Not that her experience is particularly broad — she's seen Merrill at work for years, but her friend is judicious, and wary, and Hawke's fairly certain she's killed most other blood mages she's come across. To be fair to herself, they've generally started off by trying to kill her. Either way, not much opportunity for analysis.

But all magic is unique, though it comes from the same source. Hawke could track Merrill or Anders across half of Thedas by the marks they leave with every spell worked. She would know Bethany, and her father. Even Fenris leaves eddies and whirls in the Veil.

The spell hovering about her is the vicious, mindless cousin of the spell within the graffiti's ink. The same breath shaped them, the same voice and hands; each spell glitters like fool's gold in the sun. Hawke inhales, eyes closed and one hand stretched out before her: an old trick, and a risky one — open your inner eye wide enough, and all sorts of things come crawling in. She exhales, her breath spins in slow bright circles behind her eyelids, and slowly, slowly, takes the shape of a woman's form.

There: blood and decay, the hot glitter of pride. The impression is gone in an instant, before Hawke can breathe again — but not before she feels the pearl, glowing at the woman's heart.

 _No more delaying, Hawke. Your hour's wasting._

She walks into the midst of the voices, where all the sounds slur into nonsense and the dying spell hisses in her direction. If it could, it would sting the eyes out of her head and leave her screaming on the floor, but all it can do now is rage in her direction. After Meredith, and the rain, the black flowers and the sight of Nettle crumpled against the ground, Hawke is fresh out of fear to spare.

A quick bit of triage leaves the weeper and the laugher to be ignored; she passes the singer too, wincing as their voice cracks and turns the next note sour. She hopes they'll exhaust themselves soon, and find some comfort in sleep. The two murmuring voices get all her attention. Hawke pauses to consider which cell to approach first — a macabre thought tells her to flip a coin — but takes the one on her left when Nettle sniffs in that direction. She has to stand on tiptoe to reach the barred window, and immediately regrets grabbing the bars to support herself. Sticky, clammy, they leave her palms streaked with filth. No help for it, no time to waste. Nettle paces behind her, bumping against Hawke's legs every time she circles back.

"Hello," she calls, gently. The murmuring stops, then picks up again, as if there had been no interruption. "I'm Hawke. May we talk for a moment?"

She feels ridiculous, even by her standards, but it can't hurt to start off following the usual forms. No reason to be rude. The poor bastards couldn't help being driven mad.

After waiting for a few moments, and receiving no response, she clears her throat and tries again. "I won't take up much of your time. May we talk?"

Nothing. If not for the steady drone coming from inside the cell, Hawke might have been talking to air. She thinks of fetching a torch, just to see who she's trying to coax into speaking, but she'd rather not draw the guards' attention more than she has to, and bringing fire near any of the survivors seems like a bad idea.

Well, certain kinds of fire. Hawke glances down the hall at the guards, who are absorbed in their card game, then slips a hand through the bars. She has a brief flash of worry — what if the cell's occupant is at the door, and feeling bite-y? — then conjures a weak flame right inside the door, too low to illuminate her face. Now she has enough light to see the whole cell, and the pathetic form heaped on a cot against the far wall.

If they notice the light, it does nothing to stop their murmuring. On and on they go, their voice spilling out of what could be no more than a pile of rags, save for the hand tracing circles on the wall.

" _Psst_ ," Hawke whispers, self-consciousness an unfamiliar weight in her belly. Her feet start to ache from hovering on tiptoe. "Could I interrupt, for just one mo —"

"Too _loud_." The rags shudder, then roll toward her. A face peers from the rags, all wide eyes and slack mouth. A scabbed-over gouge runs across their lips, greasy with a poultice. Hawke feels a little relief, amid her pity. At least the guards aren't just leaving the survivors to rot without care. At least they haven't been forgotten. "You're too loud. Bright. Too much."

Hawke resists the urge to snatch her flame back. "I'll be gone in a moment," she promises. "But can we talk, just a bit? I want to try and help you."

"Too bright!" The guards' armor scrapes as they rise, and Hawke extinguishes the flame with a silent curse. "You're too _bright_ , like all the others. Like the other one."

"Like the woman?" Hawke asks, focusing through the dark toward the cot. "The golden woman?"

"Champion." The guards are walking toward her, booted footsteps echoing through the corridor. "Is all well?"

She waves them back, again without looking. They hesitate at the edge of her vision, their armor gleaming dully in the torchlight, but fall back when she finally turns and gives them a smile and nod.

A swollen face with bloodshot eyes is waiting for her behind the window bars. She recoils, more from the reek of their breath than from being startled, but manages to hold still when the survivor strokes her fingers.

"You know her." Their face is barely six inches from Hawke. No escape from their breath, which is like a charnel house in high summer, or the feverish touch of their fingers on hers. "The golden woman. Yes."

Is that longing in their voice? Hawke swallows. There's too much saliva in her mouth, and the spell keeps buzzing at her ears. Nettle paces, panting. "We haven't met," Hawke says. "But I want to find her. Do you know her name? What did she want?"

The survivor laughs, baring a mouth missing half its teeth. Under the grime and greenish bruises, Hawke finally sees they're a woman, good Marcher features obscured by madness and suffering. "She told us, she wanted someone angry. Someone _strong_. To deliver a message. And when she found him, she told the rest of us we had work to do. She was so loud. Bright. Brighter than you, all swollen up with light. It wasn't hers." The woman digs a fingernail into the space between Hawke's gloved thumb and first finger. "You've still got all of yours."

"For now." The magebane itches, the only sign any of it still remains. "I'm lucky."

The woman laughs again. Hawke wonders if they've met before, in Darktown or on Lowtown's midnight streets. Have they fought each other? Seven years has made a blur of so many faces. Hawke will never know.

"Lucky, lucky," she chants, pressing her face to the bars. "No, Champion. No. Not lucky at all. The message was for _you_." The finger digging into Hawke's hand jabs toward her scarred cheek. She jerks away. "He was cold and empty, but he hated you. That's what she wanted. Told him she'd fill him up again if he hurt you a little bit."

Hawke's stomach plummets, leaving nothing but an oily, shifting weight behind. Every inch of her skin feels flushed, and the sea's whisper has dropped to nothing.

 _Even prettier than they said_ , he told her, and then the light flashed on his gauntlet and there was blood on the floor, her tooth white and innocent in the center of it.

"Why?" she breathes, when she finds her voice. "What does she want? Who is she?"

"She told us it wouldn't hurt," says the woman, pulling her hand back. Her voice throbs, full of tears and quiet betrayal. "But it did. It _does._ " She steps away from the door, fading back into the darkness. The murmurs begin as soon as she vanishes from Hawke's sight.

Hawke lingers at the door, ignoring her aching feet and the hole in her hand. She is cold, cold to her bones and to her heart, save for the right side of her face. There, she burns, hot enough for the skin to split and curl and bleed anew.

A hand on her shoulder brings her back to herself. Blinking hard, she finds Aveline staring down at her, the guard-captain's face a blank mask.

But her eyes — a shadow lingers there, one Aveline can't discipline away.

"What is it?" Hawke asks, pushed out of her ice-locked thoughts into worry for Lindie. "Is there —"

"You need to come with me," says Aveline, and keeps her hand on Hawke's shoulder all the way back to her office.

* * *

A leather pouch sits dead-center on Aveline's desk, bland and inert as a biscuit. Hawke spares it a single glance before turning toward the fire, Aveline's frugality not stretching to firewood. Nettle pushes past her to take up the best spot at the fire's base, leaving Hawke to content herself with a chair a few feet away.

"Are we done with the suspense now?" she asks, sharper than she intends. It's impossible to sit in this office, in this chair, without remembering the last time she was here: come to bother Aveline with news of strange graffiti, bearing a bag of still-warm chestnuts.

What would have been different if she'd managed to get the words out? How hard would that have been? _Oh, Aveline, before you evict me to deal with guard-captain things, there's some strange artwork popping up all over the city. Serpents or dragons, and they have ever so many teeth. Might be worth taking a peek?_

Her cheek throbs beneath still-flushed skin. She scrubs her hands over her damp skirts.

Aveline prods the leather pouch with a gloved finger. "Open it." Her voice is a long grey void.

Hawke hefts the bag slowly, frowning. She doesn't have time to play guessing games, or indulge Aveline's rare foray into dramatics, and is just about to say so when Aveline speaks again.

"Took it off the bastard in the alley, while you were checking on Nettle." The mabari pricks her ears forward at the sound of her name, but otherwise doesn't stop gently roasting her belly in front of the fire. "Open it, Hawke."

"Aveline, just tell me what's in it, I don't want to —" The shadow flashes through Aveline's gaze again. Hawke shuts her mouth, and yanks the drawstring open. The bag's contents tumble into her lap, surprisingly heavy. There's a twist of elfroot and dragonthorn tied up with red silk thread, a knot of what looks like human hair, and a few chestnut shells. There's a key, tarnished almost black, which accounts for the heaviness. And there, at the bottom of the pile, a pair of earrings.

Her body recognizes them before her mind does. They swing from her ears, a cool, satisfying weight against her neck when she turns her head. The demure candlelight sets the sapphires dancing, and the silver setting gleams. Her mother's earrings, unearthed from the Amell vaults after nearly three decades, now cold and heavy as grave's dirt in the palm of her hand.

 _I took them off and — no, Fenris took them off as he was taking down my hair, and we laughed, and I shut them in their box and locked them away in my dresser. They had to walk past my bed to get them. I might have been sleeping. They might have watched me. These were my mother's._

Hawke bursts out laughing. How foolish of her to think there would be an end to what she could take. There is always a little farther to go.

"I didn't even know they were missing," she says to Aveline's white, startled face. "I didn't — do you think they're trying to tell me they can hurt me whenever they like?" She closes her hand around the earrings, and the hooks pierce glove and skin alike. Blood wells under the leather. "Because I already knew that."

The pain washes over her, clean and forgiving, as her mind tries to float off like a dandelion seed on the breeze, but the sea's voice fills her, steady as iron.

"Hawke, I don't —" Aveline's jaw shifts, eyes moving from Hawke's face to her clenched fist. "Are you all right?"

What a kind, pointless question. Hawke doesn't try to answer it. She focuses very hard instead on opening her fist, and letting the earrings fall back into her lap. They lie there, dead as the mother who wore them, while she tells Aveline what little she learned in the cells.

* * *

It's barely evening when Hawke begins her walk home. The worst of the rain is over, though the expected drizzle keeps the streets slick and gloomy. At last it's warmer now than when she arrived at the Keep.

The warmth and drizzle conspire, because Kirkwall will find some way to be miserable, and produce a dingy, ragged fog that obscures Nettle as soon as she gets five paces ahead of Hawke. Instead of calling her back each time she ranges forward, Hawke lets her go, smiling on reflex whenever she bobs back into sight. They're the only ones out and moving in this part of Kirkwall, and it'll be a brave bandit who tries to take on a mabari in the fog.

 _Especially the Champion's mabari_. Nettle bounds back toward Hawke for a scratch between the ears, then heads back into the fog, sniffing after Maker knows what. Hawke follows, staff in hand, at her own pace.

She's not thinking of much, and doing quite well at it, until her foot hits a loose stone and her waist pouch bangs into her hip. The key and the earrings rest within, and while she gains her footing the same bold, loose laugh tries to climb through her throat. Fog and stone warp the little sounds that manage to make it out of her mouth, skimming past her ears like arrows. Hawke clamps a hand over her mouth, swallows the rest of the laughter. The last thing she needs is to start rumors of the Champion wandering through Hightown, cackling, paints smeared and hair tangled.

 _A little longer_ , she tells herself, putting one foot before the other. The pouch drags at every step. _Then you can laugh yourself stupid into a pillow. Keep going._

Her little stumble left her more unsteady than she realized. She blinks, and finds herself on her hands and knees. Tiny green things grow in the cracks between the stones. She tastes them in the back of her throat, bright as fever.

Hawke vomits. The fever-green is inside her, burning her from the nerves on out. Her skin is stone, her eyes lead balls, unmoving, and in her ears is a _noise_ like rancid fat. It crawls through her hair with a thousand tiny feet, creeping toward her mouth, and when it reaches her face she vomits again, knowing she's crying out but unable to hear her own voice.

 _Stop,_ she groans. _Please stop_.

"Nettle," she manages, or thinks she manages, though the noise keeps pressing her flat and dry as a piece of old leather. "Home. _Go home_."

The noise curls a hot tongue into her ears, then disappears. Hawke has a moment to breathe, to spit and lift her head, before someone kicks her in the knee and she topples over like a broken doll.

"Killed my _brother_ ," the someone sobs, in a fantastically predictable Tevinter accent. "I'm going to tear you apart."

 _Anything but that noise again,_ Hawke thinks, when the tattered bits of her brain start to come back together.

She immediately regrets it when a hand made of wind and blood closes around her throat. The hand lifts her like she's no more than a handful of silk, and the weight of her own body pulls apart the little bones in her neck. It's not pain so much as a vast wrongness, her body stretching as no body should, until her lungs start burning for air and black spots flower at the edge of her vision.

"Stupid howling little Fereldan _whore_." The hand hurls Hawke across the street. She hits the wall hard enough to knock her staff loose and to drive the little breath she's got left out of her lungs, then slams into the ground on her back.

The good news: the hand vanishes, leaving her time to draw a full breath, to wonder vaguely if they'll finish it quickly or play with her a while, and then she feels something wet dribbling down her face, hissing and greasy, and her legs turn to water.

"Got a lot more of this, going to make you choke on it —" The someone kicks her in the side, still sobbing. "He was my _brother_ —"

"Silvie," says a new someone, their voice careless and bright as a handful of diamonds. "Stop that. Is that any way to treat Kirkwall's own Champion? I asked you to slow her down, not…whatever it is you're doing to her."

"She killed Andric!" Another kick. Hawke vomits again, and rolls onto her side. Her right shoulder is a knot half-undone, but her left works just fine. She reaches out toward her staff, ignoring the panicked voice in her head screaming _It's coming, it's happening again, they're taking it away_ as the magebane drips down her face. "She killed my brother, Aurelia, burnt him up, and you want me to —"

The unmistakable sound of a fist hitting soft flesh cuts off the rest of the sentence. There's a pained whimper, then a soft weeping, like rain through long grass.

" _No name_ ," hisses the second voice, the sweetness cracked open with decay. Blearily, Hawke thinks of biting into an apple, and finding half a worm. "It's time to be calm now, Silvie. Can you do that?"

Hawke drags herself toward her staff. If her mana stays just a few more heartbeats —

A booted foot stamps on her hand. She doesn't cry out, doesn't do more than bare her teeth as the boot grinds down, crushing her knuckles beneath the heel.

"Now, now, Champion," says the sweet, careless voice. "We both know that won't do you any good. This mixture's my specialty. You remember how quickly it worked before, and you've had _two_ doses, yes? Be a good girl, and stay down."

The boot withdraws. Hawke resists the urge to drag her hand back and cradle it against her chest. Nothing's broken, but not from lack of trying.

"Let's talk for a moment, shall we?" A hand clad in soft leather and redolent of violets takes hold of her chin. "Just us, mage to mage."

Hawke tries not to look. She will give them nothing, nothing at all — but the woman merely laughs, digs her fingers into Hawke's jaw, and holds her still until Hawke finally looks.

"There. Not so hard, yes?" The woman lifts her veil away, smiles down at Hawke like a schoolteacher pleased at last by a stubborn student. "Hello, Rhyssa. I've heard so much about you."

Hawke's stomach clenches. Such a small violation, her name in this mouth, after all the others.

In spite of the pain, the nausea, she finds herself fascinated by the face above her: snub-nosed, dusted with apricot-colored freckles, and young, so very, very young. Her eyes are amber, her hair yellow and smooth as fresh butter.

The rain doesn't seem to touch her. Her spring-green cloak is unstained by mud or worse, and good health and warmth radiates from her body. She glitters, bright as the noon sun, and under the scent of violets, she reeks, cold turned earth and blood.

The woman — _Aurelia_ — watches, a sweetly amused smile dancing on her lips, as Hawke finally wrests away and manages to stand. "I'm going to give you a piece of advice, Rhyssa, because I think I owe you that much after…" She waves at her own face, still smiling. "Yes?"

Hawke's entire body blazes. Her mana strains at her control, its voice drowning out the sea's: _bind kill crush, stone and wind, burn to ash_.

For Margery, for Lindie, for herself. She could do it. She could burn Aurelia alive, with or without her staff, but there are a half-dozen figures behind the golden woman, staffs at the ready. She can't burn them all.

 _I don't care_.

Hawke dives for her staff.

Aurelia reaches into her cloak. Her fist clenches, she exhales, and the noise returns, bubbling out of the stones to lick and suck at Hawke's ears.

There's nothing left in her stomach but she heaves, coughing and spitting, and tries to make it the last few inches to her staff. She crawls, left hand reaching out, almost touching the wood.

"Blood and _spite_ , it won't do you any good," Aurelia says, petulant now, her voice scraping at Hawke's skin. "But it's habit now, yes? Always fighting, always scratching for a little bit more. I suppose you can't help it. A pity. Silvie, settle her down for me, darling."

The noise recedes far enough to let Hawke hear a delighted sigh, though what remains keeps her too dizzy to stand. She tries, dread at what _settle her down_ might mean telling her to go, to run, but her legs tangle and she stays low, half-crouched and gagging.

"Nothing fatal," sing-songs Aurelia. Hawke has time to see movement to her left but not enough time to react before a blade whistles out of the fog and pins her left hand to the street.

She screams as it scrapes bone on the way through, cuts herself off an instant later, but the pain is already on the hunt, dazzling every nerve until it lodges deep in her flesh. And then she's nowhere, nothing, a few broken pieces of wood floating on a rough sea.

 _Pinned like one of Mother's butterflies_ , she thinks, her mind fragmenting. Then: _they can hurt me as much as they like._ She could die here, tonight, and wouldn't that be the most hilarious irony? A pack of mad blood mages, doing Meredith's work for her?

Aurelia crouches at Hawke's side, stroking her hair. "Now, you will _listen_? Someone will be along any moment, and I don't have time to waste. I really shouldn't be doing this at all." She sighs as her fingers snag on a tangle. "Look at you. He went so _far_. My fault. I should have been clearer, yes? Still — let me warn you, this once, Rhyssa. Stay down, like a good girl, or I'll make the Hanged Man look like a broken fingernail. We don't need you now, and you won't stop us again."

Shaking, another scream bubbling up her throat, Hawke turns to face Aurelia. The golden woman smiles, fingers skimming down to touch Hawke's unscarred cheek. "There," she says, almost purring. "Be a good —"

Hawke spits in her face. Aurelia shrieks and flails away, swiping at her face. "I don't stay down," she hisses, blinking away the black spots massing again in her eyes. "I'll burn you, all of you, I'll —"

She stops, swallows. Her mana surges, so hot her fingers seem about to kindle the stone itself, but Aurelia doesn't react. None of them do. What mage can't sense another, so close to an attack?

One who doesn't know. The magebane coats her face, her neck, and that's what Aurelia feels, not what still lives beneath.

The _why_ and _how_ will have to wait, now that the _who_ has been revealed so dramatically. Hawke's world narrows to a handful of sensations: steel against bone, hot blood on her wrist and pooling on the stones, the distant warning tremble of the noise, waiting. At the center of it all, Hawke calculates.

 _Nothing fatal._

They're not going to kill her unless she gives them a reason to. They'll hurt her to send a message or perhaps simply for the pleasure of it, but she'll live, and they don't hear the song ringing in her chest. They really do think her helpless.

Her uncle sold her to Kirkwall to save her life. The debt will never be paid, not in something so simple as gold. If she's to be the Champion, it will eat her alive and still demand more. What's a little more pain, then, a little more blood, but another payment on her debt? How lucky for Kirkwall: she'll always have more of those to give.

They'll hurt her, but they don't _know_ , and she can use that. Only if she waits. Then, she can burn them out. Root, branch, and fruit.

Hawke holds back the spell, teeth gritted through the pain, and simply watches as Aurelia gags and scrubs her face clean. Her cloak came askew in her race to get away from Hawke, and a golden chain with a heavy pearl pendant swings free against the green silk.

 _How disappointingly literal._ Still, it draws Hawke's eyes like a bee to flowers. Something pulses at the edge of her awareness, and her mouth fills with salt. Longing nearly crushes her ribs. Homesickness, she realizes through a haze of pain, before Aurelia yanks her head up by the hair.

"I'd like to see you try." Aurelia lets go of her head, then jostles the knife with the toe of her boot. Hawke bites savagely into her cheek to keep from screaming or setting the street ablaze. She'll only have one chance, _one_. She can't waste it. "And I suppose I will, yes? Farewell, Rhyssa."

She vanishes into the fog, her silent companions swirling around her like moths. The noise goes with her.

Hawke listens for their footsteps to return, as the salt and the longing fade from her body. When she counts to thirty, and no sound comes, she grits her teeth and pulls the knife out of her hand, tossing it away to clamp her hand over the wound. The pain nearly knocks her flat, but she breathes in thick greedy gulps until she thinks her legs will obey.

She's survived worse. She'll survive this. And now, she has a surprise for Aurelia, when their paths cross again.

Hawke wraps her pierced hand in her cloak, picks up her staff, and begins the walk home. She stumbles, once or twice, but soon Nettle bursts out of the fog with Anders close behind.


	13. Chapter 13

**Previously:** Hawke finally got the chance to speak with one of the surviving rioters, who implied the golden woman — whoever she is — is running a far deeper game than Hawke can guess. The revelation that these unseen enemies have been inside her house added to her pressure, and while she puts her best face on it, the arrival of the golden woman herself threatens to push her over the edge.

But this is Hawke; one could argue she lives over the edge.

Onward…

* * *

Anders' hiss seems to come from deep beneath the earth. Hawke pauses, half out of her dress, and catches his eye. "What is it?"

"What — look at you, Hawke. Maker's breath, what _happened_?"

She follows his gaze, which for the moment is focused on her right arm. Small wonder he is, she's a mass of new bruises from shoulder to wrist, with a few cuts thrown in for good measure. Hawke tries clenching her right fist, and manages to close her fingers and thumb together, but winces the whole way. Her right knee creaks sourly when she bends it, and swallowing hurts.

"Nothing seems to be broken," she says, and steps out of her dress to stand in only her stained chemise and shift.

" _Seems_ to be —" Anders chokes as he storms across the room, feathers fluttering madly about his shoulders. "Are you all right? Did you hit your head? Can you tell me anything?"

Three very different questions, each with their own separate answers. "I'm fine, and maybe, and…I don't know, Anders."

He boggles at her, mouth working, then lifts her right arm and rotates her shoulder. Hawke bites her cheek and tries to pull away — there's something in his casual handling that makes her skin itch, but she can't wrap her head around why. She simply waits, while he prods at her ribs and collarbone, the itch growing when he doesn't let her go.

"That's enough." She wrenches away, cradling her arms against her chest. "I said I was fine. I just need a bath, that's all."

"In my experience, no one who staggers out of the fog looking the way you did is _fine_ ," he fires back, following her as she back away. "Hawke, you're hurt, and I'm trying to help, please, talk to me —"

"Don't touch me!" she shouts when he grabs her bandaged wrist. The scratches burn under the pressure of his hand, then sing as she yanks herself free. "Just — leave me alone, Anders, just go."

"You don't want me to do that." He stays where he is, thank Andraste, but Hawke knows he'll make another move the first chance he gets. "I need to take another look at your hand, and _you_ need to tell me what's going on. It was horrible, Hawke, you have no idea, seeing you like that."

"It must have been so hard for you," she says through numbs lips, and backs away another few steps. Everything is too bright, too close, and if he touches her again she'll start screaming and not stop. "My apologies, Anders. I won't do it again."

"For f— that's not what I mean, and you know it." His hands open and close, uselessly. "Nettle comes to the door, howling like there's a whole pack of darkspawn on her tail, and won't stop till I come out with her, and there you are, staggering and — and _humming_."

 _oh where are you going says Miller to Mulder_

Something in his voice pierces the thin voice filling her head. Hawke comes back to find herself shivering and huddled against the wall, her arms crossed in front of her chest. Her left hand aches beneath a sticky poultice Bodahn had to apply, because Anders couldn't touch her till she rinsed off the magebane's scummy remnants, and her wrists burn, Beyân's last message searing her skin.

"What happened?" Anders asks, so gentle the words are nearly sighs. "Who did this to you?"

Hawke tries to inhale, but her chest closes up and she can only gasp through a tiny pinhole. "It was —" She presses her right hand against her forehead. _Stay down, yes? Be a good girl_. "It was a team effort, really," she says, when she catches her breath. "The downside of popularity. Everyone wanted to take their shot."

Her pulse thunders in her ears, but the sound warps, comes dribbling and tar-hot into her head, and everything shades green, her hands, the fire, even Anders' horrified face. The echo lasts only a moment, and the green sheets away when she blinks, but oh, _Maker_ , she's never going to be able to unhear that noise, not till the end of her days.

 _I will not be sick. I will not faint. I will not be more useless._ Hawke digs her nails into her thighs, welcoming the bright spots of pain. Her entire mind seems to shudder, and for a long moment she tiptoes along the edge of falling into the dark water splashing across her vision. She could let go, and float away, and simply not worry — but the pain anchors her, in the end, and she steadies herself against the wall.

"Sorry," she says, breathing low and flat. "That was…I was —"

"Maker," Anders whispers. "What did Meredith do to you?"

Hawke barks a laugh, and stumbles toward the couch. They'll have to burn the damn cushions now that her filthy hair's all over them, but she can't find it in herself to care. "Oh, Anders, believe me when I say, Meredith was almost the _high point_ of my day." She stretches her arms out in front of her, wrinkles her nose at the sharp, cloying smell of elfroot. "Talk about things I never thought I'd say."

"I'll take your word for it." Anders misses the light tone he's aiming for by a few leagues, but Hawke's gratitude at him not pushing the issue — for the moment — nearly overwhelms her. He crouches before her, hands already shining and the air rippling around them. "Tell me what I can do to help, Hawke. Anything. Just ask."

The way he looks at her would frighten her, any other day. There's no tenderness in his gaze, just a light she dares not meet head-on.

 _I would drown us in blood to keep you safe._

"I just need to take a bath," she says, rising slowly, every joint creaking. "That's all, Anders."

His face falls. She knows she's disappointed him yet again, but the hot water beckons, and she leaves him kneeling, alone with his thoughts.

* * *

"I suppose it should no longer surprise me," says Fenris, with the particular mixture of scorn and anger he produces in such easy, vast quantities, "when you make ridiculous decisions, and yet —"

"At some point, Fenris, you're going to have to decide whether or not you're going to be angry every time my reasons are 'It seemed like a good idea at the time', because I am _tired_ of guessing which side you'll choose on a given day."

The words boil out of Hawke's mouth before she thinks about what she's saying. Then, she sees the slapped, waxen cast of Fenris' face, and her own anger veers sharply into regret. All she'd wanted, the whole time she was scrubbing her skin red and sore, was for Fenris to return from wherever the day had taken him. But somehow her retelling of her misadventures had gotten away from her, and now they keep snapping at each other, drawing blood as only lovers can.

They stare at each other across the room, like travelers watching the bridge between them collapse. Hawke runs her hands through her hair and turns to the window, searching for the right apology. His reflection's eyes go to the bandages, then to her bruised neck, and he shakes his head.

"I don't want to fight," he says, for the second time, though his reflection belies his words. Arms folded, shoulders so hard they could hold off half the city guard; his body is a lock that can't be picked. "Hawke, you —"

"So why are we still going around about this?" That was a mistake; now his reflection is back to glaring at her, mouth compressed to a thin line. Hawke closes her eyes and presses her forehead to the cold glass. "I'm tired. Everything hurts, and —"

"Small surprise," Fenris mutters, each word like acid on Hawke's skin. "You were a fool, Hawke, and you —"

"Maker help me, if you say I have no one to blame but myself one more time, I will tear the house down with my bare hands." She considers bashing her head against the window frame, but that means bringing Anders into the fray to scold her for undoing his hard work. That, or he and Fenris will tear into each other. Better to throw herself out the window and be done with everyone.

"You had an advantage," Fenris says, clipped and cold and utterly, incandescently furious, "and you did not use it. What else should I call it?"

Hawke buries her hands in her hair and tries to breathe. Her left hand aches around the new-healed flesh, and the tension in her back radiates down her bruised right arm. Anders did an excellent job healing her, as always, but she'll be sore for days while her body does the rest of the work. If she doesn't throw herself out the window first.

"I was alone," she begins, only to have Fenris ride over her, voice tight and merciless.

"Because you sent Nettle away —"

"To the house!" she shouts, whirling around. "To get _help_ , and because I'd already seen her down once and that was enough for one day. And really, it's thanks to that I'm standing here for you to sneer at, so maybe you could — you could just _stop_ calling me foolish because I did something you don't like, for a change."

"It's not a matter of _liking_ anything," he spits back. He won't look at her, nor anywhere near her. "You had a chance to defend yourself, and did not. You had an advantage, and refused to use it. By any definition —"

"By _yours_."

"— that is foolish." Fenris unknots enough to stand up. He moves like every muscle hurts, and Hawke finds she does not, at the present moment, give a single shit. They haven't fought like this in years, though they're doing quite well at making up for lost time. "But — I'm listening."

"Oh, thank you ever so much for that," she says, sneering herself now. "I'm blinded by gratitude."

Fenris opens his mouth, shuts it with a snap. Hawke drags her fingers out of her hair and turns around, back to the window.

"There were a half dozen of them, at least," she says, voice trembling with the effort not to shout. "I could have killed some of them, yes, and with Nettle there, maybe more, but — there was a noise, and…"

It sounds so flimsy, especially with Fenris watching her, sullen and glowering, in the window. How strange; she never minds when people think she's stupid, unless it's Fenris. Not even Anders jabbing at her makes her feel quite this hollow, this built of broken glass.

"Never mind," she says, running her fingers over the scratches on her arms — and didn't those give Anders a turn when he unwound the old bandages? — and the healing wound on her left hand. "I was alone. I was foolish. You win."

"I don't want to win," he says, so tired Hawke's heart burns. "I want to _help_. Whatever blows you can't take, I can. If I had been there…"

"You weren't. No one was." It's not an accusation, but it hangs in the air like one. Hawke feels him flinch, and shuts her eyes. She always does the most harm when she's not trying. "I did what I thought was best, and she doesn't know her precious magebane didn't work. It's enough for me."

Is it? Her decision seems so idiotic now in the light of Fenris' anger: just a shortcut to more pain, more suffering. Or is that what she wanted, and Aurelia merely gave her the excuse?

 _They were in my house,_ she wants to scream. Maker help her, she didn't even get to tell Fenris about the earrings, or ask where the day had taken him.

Hawke leans her head against the window. "I don't want to fight," she echoes. Her breath fogs the glass. "It's done. I did what I did."

The worst of it all, she realizes, is that they're arguing for the same thing, but from a world apart.

She hears his feet glide over the carpet, and holds her breath. For the first time she can remember, she prays Fenris doesn't touch her. Too many hands, clawing and prodding, till every inch of her body is smudged dark with other thoughts, other desires, other plans. She can't bear any more, not even his.

"You did," says Fenris, a long time later. "I will go."

Hawke doesn't trust herself to speak. She's still angry, still disappointed in herself and so embarrassed she can hardly see straight — a fool she was, and always will be, it seems — but even through her anger, Fenris leaving freezes her heart solid in her chest.

He comes a step closer, and another. She feels him lift his hand, his leathers rustling as he moves, and then he sighs. "I'll be back tomorrow," he says, so close his breath stirs her hair, raises gooseflesh under her robe. Hawke nearly turns and throws her arms about him — he would stay if she asked, and they would fight more but they would fix it, as they always do — but she is too tired, and her whole body cringes from even the idea of contact. "Rest well."

She nods without turning around.

He closes the door behind him, soft as snow falling. The crier calls out the time in the street below her window; it's just seven o'clock, and the morning is a lifetime away.

* * *

Orana is nowhere in sight when Hawke makes her way to the kitchen the next morning, sometime after ten o'clock. There's a bowl of boiled eggs on the table, along with butter, jam, three kinds of bread, and the usual assortment of cheese and hothouse fruit. There's also Anders, hunched over his tea mug like it's the last spot of warmth in the entire city.

Maker forgive her, but Anders is the last person she wants to see. The thought of some snide comment about Fenris' quick exit the night before makes her back prickle almost as much as the thought of him wanting to peer at her wounds. She very nearly turns around — she might have been wakened by her stomach growling, and the last meal she remembers might be yesterday's breakfast, but she's going to need a little more time to gird herself before she can actually eat at the same table as him.

"Oh, Hawke." She drops her head, and manages to haul a smile into place before meeting Anders' eyes. "I didn't think you'd be up for a while. Are you — how do you feel?"

"About as expected." She doesn't sit, though the smell of toasted bread makes her mouth water. "I'll live to fight another day, if that's what you're worried about."

Anders' forehead creases. He hunches a little closer to his tea. "I'm worried about a friend," he says, low enough Hawke could ignore it, if she chose to. "But I won't push, if you don't want me to."

Hadn't Merrill said essentially the same, barely a day ago, at this very table? It took so much out of Hawke to tell Fenris everything she hasn't spared a thought for telling anyone else. She hasn't even imagined what they would say — but they've shared so much, all these years; who's to say this story, its madness and blood and salt, would be the strangest they'll ever encounter?

Hawke takes her seat on her usual stool, and reaches for the bread. While she cuts slices from the loaf and smothers them in butter, Anders pours her a fresh mug of tea, then pushes the little jug of cream toward her. She hands him the end of the loaf, the bit he likes best, and they eat in thoughtful silence.

"At the risk of sounding like someone out of Varric's novels —" she begins, only for Anders to let out a dry chuckle around a mouthful of bread.

"I hate to break this to you, Hawke, but you already are." He grins as he swallows. "Immortalized forever in print."

"I was trying to repress that particular memory, thank you, but yes, I know." She moves the edge of her knife through the butter, carving whorls into the golden surface. "I haven't…been very forthcoming with all of you, with what's happened. Happening."

Anders chews bread, his face a calm, unbroken mask, but his hand grips his mug hard enough to make his nails go white. Hawke pretends not to see. "So there is something," he says, when the bread is gone and he's wiped his fingers clean. "You've told Fenris?"

Too neutral by half. Hawke rubs the sore spot on her left palm with her thumb, not quite pressing, but reassured by the aching skin. "Not as soon as I should have, but yes."

"So why not the rest of us?" Anders plucks an apple from the bowl and begins to peel it with his knife, all in one long strip. Hawke focuses on his hands, rather than his face. "Surely we could be of _some_ help, if you decided to let us in on your —"

He cuts himself off. His nostrils flare, and a muscle works in his thin cheek. "We can help, if we know," he says, once the apple's peel has fallen to the table.

"It's not a pretty story," she says, which is admittedly a weak and cowardly preamble, but not enough to warrant Anders jamming his knife into the apple with a hard exhale. The blade makes an all too familiar sound as it pierces the fruit; Hawke freezes as her left hand burns with remembered pain, and doesn't pull away before Anders grabs her arm and holds up her bandaged hand.

"I had _no_ idea," he says, with just enough of a sneer to drop a red, misty veil over her eyes. "None at all."

"Stop _grabbing_ at me whenever you want," she snaps, pushing away the rest of her breakfast and standing up. "And stop sneering at stupid little Hawke while you're at it, because I've had enough of that from _everyone_ , even if it is deserved."

"Yes, I heard," Anders replies, almost smug now. Hawke itches to shake him, but she settles for digging her nails into her sore palms instead. Under the pressure, the wound in her left hand cracks open. If the sea whispers at all in her head, she can't hear it over her pounding heartbeat. "And for once, I agree with Fenris."

"Oh, lovely, common ground at last." Hawke can't help laughing. "Just what I always wanted."

Anders clearly doesn't want to laugh — the way he tries to keep his mouth from twitching looks almost painful — but in the end he gives in with another dry chuckle. "This is serious, Hawke," he says. "We're worried. And we _can_ help. If you let us."

It was so much easier, she thinks, when he was just a snippy Grey Warden and she was a refugee with dirt caked under her fingernails. When they were nothing, least of all to each other.

"I know," she says, inching back toward the table. "But it's all…" She opens her hands, the now-bloody bandage stark in the late morning light, unsure of how to go on. "Maker. Where to start?"

"At the beginning." Anders leans forward, eyes too bright, too avid. Hawke's voice falters, and in the silence while she tries to find the words, Bodahn bursts into the kitchen, Nettle at his heels.

"Oh, messere!" he cries, but Hawke's attention is on Nettle. Instead of bounding about and sniffing at the table, the mabari has her head low between her shoulders, and her hackles have risen.

"What is it? What's happened?" Her mind spins, a dozen terrible scenarios playing out all at once in her mind's eye: Merrill taken by the templars, another riot, Carver hurt. "Bodahn?"

"There's someone here to see you, messere."

"What, a _caller_?" Hawke swears under her breath. How stupid of her to forget; by visiting Lady Aix yesterday, in broad daylight, she'd announced her return to society, and opened herself to the endless, pointless round of visits and tasteless cakes and comments about how _high_ some people have climbed, indeed. Horror fills her. "Maker, tell me it's not the de Launcets."

Anders snickers, but Bodahn shakes his head so hard his beard quivers.

"No, no, messere, it's — the knight-commander's here to see you. I've shown her into your mother's — the back parlor, and —"

"Bodahn," says Hawke, as measured as she can while moving to block Anders' path to the door. Not that she needs to, he hasn't moved a muscle, just gone pale and waxy as cheese. "Please tell me I didn't just hallucinate you telling me Meredith is here, in my _house_ , and you just —"

"Showed her into the back parlor, yes." Poor Bodahn is just as pale as Anders, save for two vivid spots of crimson on his cheeks. "She's alone, messere. She said she wished to speak with you, about your errand?"

 _It's probably too early for her to arrest me. She'd want to give me the full midnight-raid experience._ Hawke shakes her hair out of its knot and finger-combs it over her shoulders. Her dress's neck isn't high enough to hide her bruises, but if the lights are low and Meredith is as disgusted by Hawke's existence as usual, she might not notice. Nothing to be done about the bandages and the circles under her eyes, though.

 _You're wasting time, idiot. Go._

"I'll go right in," she says, squeezing Bodahn's shoulder. Behind her, Anders takes a greedy breath.

"Hawke —"

"I won't be long," she says, giving him her best _stay here or I'll bury you upside down in a pig sty_ look before dragging her charming idiot smile into place. "Don't worry, Anders, she's not going to arrest me in Hightown."

"Don't give her ideas," he says, through a locked jaw.

Excellent advice. Hawke smoothes her grey dress, tugs the sleeves as far down as she can, and follows Bodahn into the back parlor.

She rarely uses this room; her mother happily reoccupied it when they won back the estate, and put all the old Amell treasures left back into their rightful places, and it was here that Hawke found the lilies, six hours before she found what was left of her mother. Now, she uses it only when Hightown nobles come to visit — no cheery, cluttered front parlor for them, no — and imagines she can still smell the lilies, haunting the dry, cold air.

Meredith stands in the middle of the room, polished and immaculate, staring up at the vast oil painting above the fireplace. Her lip curls, ever so slightly, as Hawke enters.

"Aristide Amell, my grandfather," Hawke says by way of greeting. "My mother's father. I'm delighted to say I inherited his house, and not his ears."

"He was an honorable man, from what I've been told. The Amells were a great house." Meredith, of course, manages to make the past tense settle around Hawke's shoulders like a yoke made of granite.

"The Amells still live," Hawke replies, unable to resist. "In blood, and in name."

"Yes, you have a cousin in Kinloch Hold. Knight-commander Greagoir spoke highly of her, and her assistance to the Hero of Ferelden." From anyone else, these would be mere facts, not veiled threats or insults. Hawke really has to marvel at Meredith's powers of contempt. "Cerys Amell. A loyal Circle mage to her bones."

"Well, we all have our flaws." Meredith finally looks in Hawke's direction. Hawke smiles harder, brighter. "You could have saved yourself the trip to Hightown. I planned to make my little report this afternoon." Not quite a lie; dealing with Meredith was certainly on the day's agenda. Somewhere. "But I'll be quick, I know your time is valuable."

"I'm grateful." Flat as parchment. "But as you lingered in the Keep some time yesterday, I assumed you had fulfilled my request, and decided not to delay getting your answers. I myself have business in the Keep today."

 _Trying on the Viscount's crown, taking a nap in the throne room?_ Hawke shoves the thoughts away in favor of a prayer of gratitude Meredith seems to be unaware of yesterday's other adventures. There's a chance the good knight-commander is waiting to spring that upon her later — but that's not quite Meredith's style. Why use subtlety, when you can afford not to?

"Aveline wasn't exaggerating. Only one of the survivors —" A little emphasis there, because the poor wretches certainly aren't fomenting rebellion in the Keep's dungeons. "— was able to talk, and she wasn't exactly up for much conversation." _Tread lightly, Hawke. Too much truth, and Meredith will have half this city torn apart._ "She spoke of pain, and not much else."

"Not much else."

 _Lightly_. "When I asked her why, she couldn't say. Someone hurt her, hurt them all, and whipped them into violence. As to who — she didn't know their name. Only that they wanted anger."

That's as close to the whole truth as Hawke is willing to get. She considers dropping _the golden woman_ into Meredith's ear, but that would probably only spell misery for every blonde woman in the Gallows. No; for now, Aurelia — shining, golden Aurelia, with her freckles and whispers — will stay Hawke's secret.

A lesser woman would sniff or sigh to signal her disappointment. Meredith simply turns her head, and lets the full force of her gimlet eye sweep Hawke from head to toe. "I find it surprising you could coax so little out of her," she says, long enough for Hawke's feet to go cold in their thin slippers. "I had high hopes for your abilities. They have served you so well in the past, after all."

"That sounds dangerously like an implication, knight-commander." Hawke replaces charming idiot with wounded innocence. "Though I'm delighted you think so highly of me, of course."

"I think of you as little as possible, Champion." Meredith looks back to the fire, her fist still clenched on the mantle. Maker, it must gall her to stand in Hawke's parlor, faced with a mage she cannot touch.

 _Yet_ , Hawke thinks, with the familiar chill in her belly.

"But you are useful, in your way, and I hoped you would be again. I see I was mistaken." The firelight does nothing to soften the lines at Meredith's eyes and mouth, nor to make her look younger. To Hawke, she looks another five years old than she did yesterday. "More interested in defending your friend than pursuing peace, and justice."

"That's unfair, Meredith." She's ready for Meredith's glare, though it lands as heavy as a blow from one of those shining fists. "The survivor had little to say of use, to anyone. If you're so concerned, ask them yourself. No more sneering, no more assigning errands."

"I warn you, you come very close to —"

"To what? Offense? Insubordination? Maker, I did what you asked. If I didn't get an answer you liked, that's hardly my fault, and me agreeing with Aveline isn't a conspiracy." Her heart beats rabbit-quick; the room about her shivers as virulent green gnaws the edge of her vision. The sea's voice, mercifully, rises to block the memory of the noise, and digging her nails into her palms drives back the wavering edge of the world. "Don't see one where none exists."

"Who are you to tell me what I should or should not see?" Meredith crosses the room far too quickly for someone wearing that much armor, and stops a foot away from Hawke, looming in her steel-and-crimson glory. Long years of standing in everyone's shadows have left Hawke immune to looming, so she meets Meredith's gave without flinching, or backing up. "Your recovery has not been idle, I see that much."

 _Oh Maker, Carver._ The blood drains from Hawke's face, but she keeps her features fixed in wounded innocence, with an edge of sharp bemusement. "I'm not sure I have the slightest idea what you're talking about."

"Your visit to Lady Aix yesterday announced your return to society. A well-calculated move, I must admit. Money, standing, loyal to Viscount Dumar — you could not have sent a clearer message."

"Actually, wait," says Hawke, "I _am_ sure. I don't have the slightest idea what you're talking about. I went to offer what help I could, because her little girl is ill."

"Spare me your dissembling. I saw how Kirkwall's nobles reacted to your misfortunes. Know this: I may be forced to endure challenges from the nobles, and even among my own men, but I will never tolerate it from _you._ Do not presume the nobles' support will garner you any real hope."

" _Hope_? You really think…?" Hawke could slap herself. Of course this wasn't just a quick stop to make sure Hawke had run her errand like a good little girl. It was a message to all of Kirkwall: even the Champion obeys the knight-commander.

"Believe what you want, Meredith. I'm not interested in power. I just want to keep my friends safe."

Meredith's mouth twists in a smirk — in no universe would Hawke call that glacial curve anything like a smile. "Yes. Of that, I am well aware. Rest assured, I never forget it."

It would be the greatest, briefest joy of Hawke's life to burn the smirk off Meredith's face. She could do it, and leave the woman screaming on the carpet till her skin turned to ash, and then everyone who had ever stepped foot in this house would die.

"As always," Hawke says, smiling once more. "I'm gratified by your forbearance. Was there anything else? I don't want to keep you from your business. You must have someone you haven't terrified into submission yet."

Meredith holds her breath. Hawke waits for the smiting — _Will it hurt? Will she make it quick?_ — but Meredith decides to sneer instead, raking Hawke with a cold, contemptuous look before she heads for the door.

"We will speak again, Champion," she says, without looking back. "Be sure of _that_."

"I'm delighted at the prospect," Hawke replies, past caring about the consequences. Meredith pauses at the door, radiating anger in almost-visible waves, but says nothing else before she closes the door behind her.

When Meredith's footsteps have faded away, Hawke lets herself drop into the nearest chair, and puts her head in her hands.

"As if I didn't have enough to worry about," she says to her aching palms. "Bloody _hell_ , I don't want to be Viscount. I don't —"

"Hawke?" A dusty, dried-herbs smell announces Anders long before he kneels before her. "Are you — are you all right?"

"Oh, I'm lovely," she says without looking up. "At least my day is looking up by comparison."

He huffs, one hand lightly touching her knee. "I couldn't help overhearing…"

"Eavesdropper." Hawke sits up, wearily, and tries for a real smile. "You were at the door right up until she left, weren't you?"

"Guilty as charged," he says, unrepentant, and almost smug. "Hawke, you…I didn't realize."

That's half the problem between them. He doesn't realize, and possibly never will, that every bit of herself she sells off — to Meredith, to everyone who comes begging for help, to Kirkwall itself — is for him, for all of them. What does she matter, if she can't keep them safe? All of them?

Anders watches her, still crouched at her feet. He touches her palms gently, blue light spilling from his skin to hers as the Veil ripples around them. His magic is wind through grass, a slow storm rolling in at dawn. She pulls her fingers away when he tries to take her hands in his; the memory of his easy possessiveness is still too fresh, even if his touch eases her pain.

Hawke scrubs her palms over her thighs. She wants to crawl back into bed, and she wants to see Fenris, and she wants to sink to the bottom of her bath and never come out, but there's work to be done.

"There is something I need your help with, Anders," she says. "A house call, of a sort."

"Anything," he replies, far too quickly. "Whatever you need."

* * *

Wind rattles the windows and blows drops of rain through chinks in the frame. A few candles go out, and though it would take nothing for either of them to coax back the flames, Orsino lets the darkness grow.

His hands don't shake as he lifts the brandy bottle to his mouth; he would not have survived long as First Enchanter without policing his own body far more intently than the templars. But they want to shake, and he wants to let them.

Maker be praised he'd had the presence of mind to burn the letter once he committed it to memory. If Hawke had seen it —

He strangles the thought in its cradle. Nothing must show on his face while Hawke watches him with that scythe of a smile, those bright bird-of-prey eyes. Well-named the daughter, and well-named the father before her.

The qunari had bled from the ears and eyes when he used the noise — _his_ noise, his bastard child born in his first years in this office — upon them. Had Aurelia smiled as she watched his gift to her at work? He supposes not knowing will keep him alive.

Hawke's smile fades. "Regretting asking to hear it all yet? Or shall I go on?"

Orsino nods. In the silence before Hawke speaks, he remembers the letter, ash now these past four years, and how long it took for the scent of violets to fade from the parchment.

 _My dear First Enchanter,_

 _Please forgive my familiar tone; our mutual friend assures me my letter will be welcome, and indeed I've heard enough of your talents to believe him. So I will call you friend, Orsino, though we haven't met, and your templars would not look kindly on me visiting your city._

 _Since we are friends, dear Orsino, I must ask you a favor. What help could you give a mage who seeks not simply power, but_ terror _? By my master's grace I have enough power to satisfy a dozen mages; what I want is something far more rarefied._

 _Our mutual friend tells me you have been of great aid to him in his work. I hope you will be the same for me. Something to usurp the senses, shake the mind from its foundation — that is what I seek. Such a thing is in your grasp, isn't it?_

 _As for what I may offer you — have you heard of the incitum? I'm surprised your templars haven't attempted to replicate it; perhaps its origin casts too great a shadow over its possible usefulness. Over the years, I've come to rely on mine quite heavily. I offer you plans for its construction, as thanks and payment. Be sure to use it quite soon after it's finished. They need to be fed._

 _I eagerly await your reply. Our mutual friend will deliver it to me, in strictest confidence. Have no fear of templar eyes; I certainly do not._

 _Most cordially,_

 _Aurelia Gentus_

* * *

Thank you, as always, for reading! I would love to know what you think.


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